Sunak’s smoking ban is a terrible policy

What, you might ask, has Rishi Sunak been smoking? There is no way to spin as conservative the idea of working towards a complete ban on cigarettes by legislating a progressive age-related bar on buying tobacco. This is not conservatism as libertarianism or as the Scrutonian practice of not taking the axe to existing social institutions. The only serious precedent is not happy: think supremely bossy Jacinda Ardern, the New Zealand premier who brought in a similar draconian ban last December before abruptly leaving politics.

Admittedly, there is on one level a kind of abstract logic here. A lacklustre Keir Starmer, seeking a shiny new health policy. would probably have hit on this wheeze himself in the next few months. This pre-emptive raid on Labour’s wardrobe neatly blocks it. Young voters who would be affected by the policy overwhelmingly don’t smoke anyway, and the older Tory supporters who like a couple of Marlboros after dinner wouldn’t be deprived of them.