ASH SUGGESTS 5% INCREASE IN TOBACCO TAX
ASH SUGGESTS 5% INCREASE IN TOBACCO TAX
Ash says many smoking addictions start in childhood. A five per cent rise in tobacco tax would lead to a substantial drop in the number of smokers and save millions in health costs, a UK charity suggests.
Such an increase would discourage children from buying cigarettes and help adults quit, a report by Action on Smoking and Health (Ash) says.
Its chief executive, Deborah Arnott, said: "Smoking is a childhood addiction and not an adult choice."
But smokers' rights lobby group Forest said cigarette smugglers would gain.
Director Simon Clark said: "The only people who will benefit from raising tobacco taxation by this amount are the criminal gangs who will smuggle millions of cheap cigarettes into the country from Eastern Europe and elsewhere." He added that many counterfeit cigarettes would be sold in pubs and on street corners on the black market, costing the Treasury up to £3bn a year.
Support for a five per cent price rise above inflation comes from Cancer Research UK, the British Heart Foundation and the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths (FSID).
Ash's report says that raising tobacco prices would reduce the number of smokers by 190,000 and save the NHS more than £20m a year by cutting the cost of treating smoking-related diseases.
It also claims a tax rise would also reduce smoking-related absenteeism in the workplace, saving more than £10m a year.
Supporters also say government tax revenues would be boosted by more than £500m a year and result in wider economic benefits in the first five years of more than £270m a year.
Written by Dr Martin Harris, Doctor and Mohel for Jewish Circumcision Clinic in London Bris Mila Brit Milah.
www.circumcisionlondon.co.uk
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