As major announcements go, it was up there with Kerry Katona’s facelift or Top Gear cancelling itself.

When Prime Minister Sunak took to the stage at the recent Tory conference, we watched, and hoped against hope, that after 13 years of rule, there were going to be solid, targeted actions to address the predominant issue affecting us all at the moment: the cost-of-living crisis/ catastrophe. This disaster has proved to be a runaway train of angst, grief and human desperation as we steal and rob, and beg and borrow, just to be able to put food on our tables and heat in our radiators.

But no: what we were left with, bereft of any tangible strategy to claw ourselves out of the self-induced mire, was an attack on a subset of the working class: the smokers.

As an ex-smoker of 20 years standing, I gave up 15 years ago and have been married to my vape ever since. The health improvements have been, for me, staggering. From being out of breath when tackling a flight of stairs, I can now cycle 100 miles no problem and, although I won’t be threatening the Olympics any time soon, as a semi centurion I am content with my fit as a fiddle, rotund dadbod.

Having failed with the economy, Rishi is now taking on a softer ‘win’ in implementation of the draconian, authoritarian, control-led banning of cigarette sales through a perverse prohibition escalator scheme. Let me explain.

For anyone born after 2008, the ability to buy cigarettes will be erased. The ban on sales will be raised by one year, every year and a time will come when a 50-year-old, like me, will be hanging around outside the local Costcutter with the teenage hoodies. Them trying to frequent a bottle of cheap Czech vodka and the smoker begging a 51-year-old to purchase him a pack of 20 B&H.

With Labour having ruined the pub trade in 2007, the Tories are now taking up the mantle where, after decades of enjoying the spoils of tobacco tax, they will do little but reopen up a once thriving black market and ensure that any gains, through cost savings in the NHS, are gobbled up by increased customs control expenditure as criminal gangs tap into the market through the importation of illicit Rothmans.

When a smoker, I bought ‘hooky’ cigarettes but once. I lived in Turnpike Lane at the time and a weather-beaten hunch-backed Eastern European woman offered me a carton of Marlboro lights for twenty quid outside of Tandy’s. I eagerly snapped them up and lit one up. That one puff brought on a coughing fit that lasted for an hour as I wretched and writhed and realised that whatever I had inhaled was not direct from the factory. And so, it will go: You think cigarettes are bad, or drugs? Then dodgy counterfeit versions are ten times worse and although they look like the real deal, they will, to the financially restricted, be an attractive option which will swamp the high streets of every town centre should this lunacy become reality.

But no, this is not a pro smoking piece. Smoking is not good for you, but neither is driving, mountain biking, drinking or over exercising and where do we draw the line when the pertinent question to ask is WHY do people do x,y or z?

People smoke because they are addicted, yes, but more so, such as me when I was an advocate, because they enjoy it. They find it relaxing. It relieves stress. Had a tough day at work? Then unwind with a cup of tea, or something stronger, and a fag, with the alternative being letting the stress overwhelm you causing increased levels of mental health issues.

Oh, and more so, I never really understand the ‘it saves lives!’ argument. The taxes collected by the Government arguably pay for any latter life care for smokers and why are we intent on prolonging life anyhow? We live on a crowded island where houses are unaffordable, with ten million more residing here than in 1997, as we come to terms with having been overwhelmed and not being able to cope, be it with the Police, getting a doctor’s appointment or any other access to public services.

If folk want to smoke, and die younger, then that is their choice and this, or any government, has no right to issue diktats to the contrary. That said, I can never see this getting through as we watch the final thrashings of an administration coming to the end of its days, as we await a different brand of lunacy next year as we switch from blue incompetency to red inadequacy…

  • Brett Ellis is a teacher