My Lords, like my noble friend I am certainly not opposed to these regulations; I am very much in favour of spatial planning. I have just one question for the Minister. I thank her very much for setting out so clearly the purport of these regulations and apologise for not being able to give advance …
My Lords, I am absolutely delighted to take part in this Second Reading debate. Although we are only a third of the way through the speakers’ list, this has already been a very moving—as well as extremely well-informed, interesting and expert—debate. Perhaps it shows the House of Lords at its best. …
My Lords, I declare my interests as a past chair and present director of Peers for the Planet. It is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord in what he has just said. We have worked together on these issues before, and I feel somehow that on the issue to which I will return, fiduciary duty, we hav…
My Lords, in relation to the amendments in this group, first, I do believe that vaping is safer than smoking. All the evidence is that it is safer, but it is of course not risk-free. Indeed, that was the position under the previous Government: in October 2023 it was stated quite clearly that vaping …
My Lords, in relation to this group, it is essential that trading standards have the resources they need. Although the government pledge of an additional £10 million is welcome, I feel it is probably not going to be enough. It is worth bearing in mind that trading standards are supportive of the Bil…
LordsCommittee Stage3 November 20252 contributions
I support this group of amendments. It is absolutely right that we have a thoroughgoing licensing scheme. Many people would be very surprised to find that we do not have a licensing scheme for tobacco, as we do for alcohol. It is unregulated, so I welcome the proposals to have a thoroughgoing licens…
My Lords, in supporting this group of amendments, it is clear that the very word “filter” is the most misleading of epithets. It leads many people to believe they make smoking safer. I would take a lot of convincing that people are not led to believe it is safer by the use of that very misleading ep…
My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing this debate and the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, for her amendment. This SI addresses the implications for Northern Ireland of the Government’s decision not to follow the Minamata Convention on Mercury on phasing out the use of mercury dental amalgam fill…
My Lords, in support of the speech we have just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, there is ample evidence of successful earlier levies, contrary to what the noble Baroness suggested. They include levies on landfill and soft drinks as well as provisions following Grenfell, as my noble friend s…
LordsCommittee Stage27 October 20253 contributions
My Lords, I will speak briefly on this group of amendments, which are regrettable, in my view. The previous Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, is to be applauded for what he did, as are the previous Government and this Government. This measure should be nothing to do with party politics.
Interestingly, t…
My Lords, I support the amendments proposed by my noble friend Lord Moylan on having the affirmative resolution procedure for statutory instruments. That seems wholly sensible.
On age verification, I strongly support the amendment proposed by my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham. Dealing with onli…
My Lords, the expertise of many Members of your Lordships’ House in electoral law matters has once again been demonstrated in this debate. From these Benches, we supported the provisions in the Elections Act 2022 to make it easy for people wishing to vote by post or proxy to apply to do so online. S…
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Leong, for introducing this statutory instrument, which is part of a secondary legislation programme implementing the reforms of the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023. Combating economic crimes is a top priority for all noble Lords, and it is e…
My Lords, I am absolutely delighted to follow the noble Lord, Lord Bourne. I share the concerns that he expressed. I am not going to oppose this statutory instrument but I want to raise some concerns about it, not least in terms of the potential impact on increasing gambling harm.
The Minister has …