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18 Jan 2008 : Column 1545
Friday, 18 January 2008.
The House met at ten o'clock: the LORD SPEAKER on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Newcastle.
Channel Tunnel Rail Link (Supplementary Provisions) Bill
Brought from the Commons; read a first time, and ordered to be printed.
Alcohol Labelling Bill [HL]
10.06 am
Lord Griffiths of Burry Port: My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Mitchell, and with the permission of the House, I rise to speak at this point in the debate and to move that the Bill be now read a second time. Some have greatness thrust upon them.
I am glad that the Bill is of such a length that I could read it properly and prepare myself in a way that allows me to speak first on this issue. I was drawn to it as a subject when I believed that its field of application would be more widely drawn than has turned out to be the case. However, even this discrete area of proposed legislation allows me to consider the points that would have been perhaps more germane had there been a wider field of reference.
I begin with both a disclaimer and an expression of interest. The disclaimer is that I speak, of course, as a Methodist—but a Methodist with a very nice wine cellar. In case there might be some misapprehension, I am proud of my church’s teaching on questions of social importance across the generations, but life is too short to go without the pleasures of life and we must find a proper way of enjoying them and, at the same time, safeguarding the vulnerable and the weak. I believe that the Bill makes one such proposal along those lines.
The expression of interest is that our daughter will, within three or four weeks’ time, produce her first child. Our daughter loved the social life, which involved the consumption of alcohol and the smoking of cigarettes, prior to her pregnancy. My wife and I have watched with personal interest my daughter’s stance on those pleasures as she began, with her husband, to think of starting a family. With great pride we can say that her readiness and her ability to give up both habits have raised her considerably in our already rather aggrandised view of her qualities.
As she is to give birth to her first child, our first grandchild, in Cambodia, I think that the misspelling of my title on the Order Paper suggests some kind of Freudian slip on someone’s part, but I am very grateful for the great care and attention that has been given to making me feel very much at home.
Who can be against the proposal at the heart of the Bill? No one, I would have thought. It is sensible to
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The reason I felt drawn to the debate is largely that I want us to remind ourselves that we should not imagine that by putting such a Bill on the statute book we will cure or solve the problem we are envisaging. In other areas of life in recent times, we can see where similar animadversions have been brought to bear on our social mores and have brought short-term benefits. For example, the safe sex campaign made a great impact when it was launched with all the advertising that went with it—some of it negative advertising showing the danger of HIV/AIDS—but more recent reports have shown that unsafe sex and sexually transmitted diseases are on the rise again. So there may well be a partial and immediate benefit to be gained from the Bill—I certainly want it to happen—but we should not imagine or delude ourselves that it will solve the problem once and for all.
A similar thing has happened in the area of smoking, where health warnings abound. It is one of the ironies of life to see people clutching a packet of cigarettes that has a health warning which is visible to those looking at the smoker; whether it is visible to the smoker is another matter altogether. When one realises the recidivism and the dependency that are built into some of these pleasures, we should never imagine that what we are considering today will once and for all deal with the problem.
How do we effect a change of culture? How do we create an ethos within which people recognise the choices available to them and choose sensibly? How do we avoid the repression of the culture I grew up in, which was so condemnatory of anything that purported to carry pleasurable connotations? How do we avoid the obvious negative aspects of that without just moving into a free-for-all ethos in which it seems that anything goes? In a post modern culture where we make up our own ethics as we go along, nothing can be supposed to be bad. How do we avoid those two extremes? It is a Scylla and Charybdis situation. Those of us who are associated with bodies that, in the public mind and common perception, are negative, condemnatory and judgmental institutions find it very difficult to persuade others that there might be proper and objective grounds for some of the restrictions and that the desire to rein back the licence is reasonable.
I commend the Bill on behalf of my noble friend. I thank the House for giving me the delusion that I am a Front-Bench spokesman and I hope that the Bill will be warmly endorsed—with the caveats that I have described.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(Lord Griffiths of Burry Port.)
10.14 am
Baroness Coussins: My Lords, I agree absolutely that it is vital for women who are pregnant, or who are planning to be, to know about the effects of alcohol on the developing foetus so they can decide
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I hope I might convince the noble Lord, Lord Mitchell, when he reads this speech, that he would see his underlying objective amply fulfilled by placing his confidence in the voluntary labelling agreement announced last May by the Government and the industry. Legislation at this point would have a disproportionately adverse impact on the industry without achieving any significant increase in women’s awareness of the impact of alcohol on pregnancy and would almost certainly produce no change in their behaviour. Indeed, some evidence suggests that if consumers are presented with information cast as a warning, as proposed in the Bill, they are likely to react unfavourably, especially if the warning comes from the Government.
If I thought that labelling was the only or the most effective way to inform women about alcohol and pregnancy, then I would have no reservations about supporting the Bill. If I thought that pregnancy labelling could be achieved only by forcing the industry to do it with legislation, I would again have no reservations. The fact is, however, that the industry has moved significantly on this issue since the noble Lord, Lord Mitchell, last introduced his Bill a year ago. I know from my 10 years as chief executive of the Portman Group that the drinks industry can often be spurred into redoubling its efforts and speeding up its actions on social responsibility if there is the threat of legislation as a backstop. However, the situation on this issue is that voluntary commitment to pregnancy labelling, if I can call it that for short, is now so widespread that the disadvantages of legislation simply outweigh the benefits of having the threat of it waiting in the wings in case voluntary labelling fails.
I want to develop my argument a little bit more. Your Lordships should know that although I no longer work for the Portman Group, I have an interest as a non-executive adviser on social responsibility to Brown-Forman, a global wines and spirits company. In my earlier career in the voluntary sector, I worked and campaigned with a number of organisations concerned with maternity and infants’ rights and welfare.
First, there is the question of timing. The Government and the industry have agreed a five-point voluntary labelling scheme, one element of which is pregnancy information that is broadly in line with what the Bill proposes. The Department of Health will monitor compliance throughout 2008 and has said that it will decide at the end of the year whether legislation is justified. The noble Lord, Lord Mitchell, knows that when his Bill comes to Committee I shall be as helpful as possible, but in the light of this timetable for the voluntary agreement I am hoping he might agree that it is putting the cart before the horse to deal with the Bill now.
Secondly, the industry is not just paying lip service. I shall illustrate with just a few figures. Taking the
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In the spirits sector, the retailers’ own brands are over one-third of the UK market, and again are already carrying the pregnancy advice or will certainly do so shortly. Of the five or six major producer companies which, between them, account for virtually all the rest of the UK’s spirits market, half are already committed to including the pregnancy advice on the label, including, I am pleased to say, the company I advise.
In the beer sector, supermarkets’ own brands are a very small part of the market, although all these now carry the pregnancy advice or have a production timetable in place to do so. It is the same with the two major producers whose brands between them make up 40 per cent of our beer market. Another two are actively considering it and others which are currently unwilling might well change their mind if there were consistent medical advice, a point I shall return to in a moment.
I hope noble Lords will agree that this represents genuine progress. I believe that by the end of the year, when the department evaluates the scheme, a significant majority of total product in the UK market will carry the pregnancy advice. Ironically, if the Bill proceeds, progress is likely to dry up because companies will no longer be sure what is expected of them. They will not want to invest this year in one new label design only to face a new statutory scheme next year. Those already complying with the voluntary scheme would effectively be penalised by having to fund two changes. It is unfair to penalise the industry’s most responsible companies in this way.
A key milestone which could trigger further compliance will be when we know the outcome of the review by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. At least two of the very largest drinks producers are currently holding back from pregnancy labelling because they are, quite defensibly, reluctant to put their reputation on the line and even risk legal action by carrying misleading or inaccurate information. In the past year we have seen conflicting advice from the Department of Health, NICE and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. Although the chief medical officers are agreed, this really must be underpinned by a solid consensus among the scientists and practitioners, otherwise the reluctance of some drinks companies will remain with good reason, despite their genuine wish to play a part.
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Noble Lords might say that if the majority of the industry is so sympathetic to pregnancy labelling and so many are already doing it, why would it be so dreadful to make it mandatory? Legislation would not ask the good guys to do anything they are not doing already, so what is the problem? The problem is that the price of mandatory labelling for all brands of all alcoholic drinks would be a disproportionate cost and serious threat to the viability of many small businesses, with a consequent impact on consumer choice. This would apply particularly in the wine sector, where thousands of small producers from all over the world, using hundreds of UK agents, use the UK market to test thousands of new wines every year. We are talking about a very small percentage of the market in volume terms, but the cost to these companies of labelling for just one market would be prohibitive and might even raise questions about fair practice within the EU’s competition regime. It would also mean that choice for the vast majority of UK consumers—who are not pregnant—would be diminished. A regulatory impact assessment is needed to calculate the effects of what may seem like a modest labelling requirement but which could have much wider ramifications.
I would happily argue that all this would be a price worth paying, and well worth paying, if it were the case that only by labelling could we inform women about the effects of alcohol on pregnancy, or even if it were the case that there was a vast knowledge gap that needed to be plugged. But neither of these things is true. In June, the Government published the revised National Alcohol Harm Reduction Strategy, which revealed that the proportion of mothers who drink during pregnancy fell in the five years between 2000 and 2005. Some 46 per cent said that they did not drink anything at all and 92 per cent of the rest drank two units or less a week. This is absolutely in line with the advice endorsed by the chief medical officers; that is not surprising, as nearly three-quarters of mothers who drank said that they had received information about drinking in pregnancy, mainly from their midwives. The others may just have been following the message from their own body which, in my experience, stops you drinking the minute you are pregnant by making you feel nauseous at the very thought.
The Government also said that they would be launching a new campaign in April this year to ensure that women are aware of the revised advice. Labelling is a sensible way of reinforcing this advice, but is by no means the primary source of information for women. Indeed, were it down to labelling alone, we should almost certainly not have such a positive story to tell. Research in the US and Denmark suggests that pregnant women’s attitudes are largely independent of the advice they get on health warning labels.
So my conclusion is that the price of forcing every producer to label every brand is not justified either by the information gap among women or by the role played by labelling within the whole range of sources of advice available. The department seems to accept this point, because it stated in the voluntary agreement that,
18 Jan 2008 : Column 1550
- “it may not be practicable or may be disproportionately costly for labels of some products to carry all or any aspects of the sensible drinking message”.
There is one other argument against legislation, to do with the principles of better regulation. If a policy objective can be achieved through voluntary action or self-regulation, it is surely a waste of public expenditure and an unwise use of parliamentary time to create, administer and police a system that the industry is demonstrably able to produce and pay for itself.
I also think that there are ways in which the Bill could be more proportionate and consistent, and I will mention them in passing, leaving more detailed discussion for the Committee stage. For example, I should have thought that the guidance on legibility of labels from the Food Standards Agency would be perfectly adequate for drinks containers, without having to go further and be as prescriptive as the Bill. The penalties also seem excessively harsh, given the existing penalties.
A lot of emphasis has been placed on action taken on labelling in other countries, particularly within the EU. But I think that the UK is leading, not catching up. France is currently the only other member state with a statutory requirement for pregnancy labelling. Finland and Sweden will follow suit, and there are discussions in a small number of other countries. But in this context, the UK’s voluntary scheme and its likely impact of a very high percentage of market volume being labelled by the end of this year looks pretty impressive to me. What would be unhelpful would be 27 different statutory schemes, each requiring a different format and different message. Already quite different labelling protocols are emerging in France, Finland and Poland. The Bill would add to the variety and the confusion. If there has to be legislation, it would be far better from the point of view of the industry and, I think, the consumer, for it to be a single piece of EU legislation prescribing a common and consistent approach across all markets.
I think that the voluntary agreement on labelling will achieve the step change in information which the noble Lord, Lord Mitchell, seeks through the Bill, but without the unintended consequences and disadvantages that I have outlined. As for improvements in behaviour in the light of that information, in the end that is down to women themselves.
10.27 am
The Earl of Listowel: My Lords, I support the Bill, as vice-chair of the Associate Parliamentary Group for Children and Young People In and Leaving Care and treasurer of the All-Party Group on Children. The noble Lord, Lord Mitchell, does a great service to the public by bringing this Bill forward and by his consistent pressure in this area. I listened with interest to my noble friend Lady Coussins. It is of great benefit to the House to have her expertise in this area brought to bear on this matter. I disagree with much of what she said, but I hope that the dynamic between support for the measure and a strong opposing voice will add value to the Bill as it goes through the House.
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I have been put in mind of the seductive commercials for advertising alcohol at Christmas. It is hard to reconcile the impetus from business to sell its product with the need to protect certain people from the harm that can arise. I am reminded of the work that Her Majesty’s Government have already done in introducing welcome measures to protect the public from the harms of cigarette smoking. I remember being horrified when I heard about the impact of tobacco smoking during pregnancy. I read about the likelihood of low birth rate, with all its associated risks. I learnt how exposure of the foetus to toxins from tobacco could lead to reduced intelligence and to the individual being of a smaller stature when he is fully grown. If the Government are to be consistent, they should accept this Bill, which should provide similar benefits for children.
We are all aware of the increase in binge drinking and particularly of young women becoming less prudent in managing alcohol. I was grateful for the encouraging statistics from my noble friend on the number of women who have been listening to medical advice and reducing alcohol consumption while pregnant. I have a particular concern about those women who become dependent on alcohol; they need the strongest and most explicit message to ensure that they desist during pregnancy. Will the Minister say what the estimated level is of women who are alcohol dependent and what the trend has been in recent years with regard to those women?
A year ago I had the opportunity to speak to some alcoholics and I was struck by two things. The first was the capacity of alcoholics to delude themselves. They would attempt to remain sober, but when they saw the opportunity for a drink they told themselves that to have one would not hurt—and then they would find themselves waking up in a park two days later. Secondly, I was struck when a woman said that when she was carrying her baby she reduced her alcohol intake, moving from spirits to wine and stout. She could see that in retrospect she had deluded herself and failed to protect her baby.
I welcome the chance that this Bill offers to reinforce to women who are alcoholic or on the verge of being so the message that by drinking they are harming their baby. The more explicit one is about the risks to their child, the greater the chance that they may seek to desist from drinking. They may even approach an organisation such as Alcoholics Anonymous for help; it may even be the opportunity for them to stop drinking for good and spare their child the risks associated with being reared by an alcoholic mother. I would read to your Lordships some comments made during a conference on women and alcohol, led by Alcohol Concern—comments that were made by children on ChildLine—but I cannot find them in my notes at the moment. A significant number of those calls were associated with children talking about their parents’ alcohol problems.
I look forward to the Minister’s response. I hope that she will lay out the timescale expected for the industry to implement what is proposed and that she will assure the House that the warnings coming from the industry will be as explicit and strong as possible.
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10.33 am
Lord Mitchell: My Lords, here was I thinking that I was 45 minutes early. I thank my noble friend Lord Griffiths for moving the Motion on Second Reading of this Bill and for the generosity of the House in allowing me to speak at this point.
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