Therese Coffey unable to say if smoking plan will be ditched

Therese Coffey was unable to say whether she would scrap a plan to make England smoke free by 2030 (File picture)

(Picture: PA)

Health Secretary Therese Coffey was criticised on Tuesday after she was unable to say whether she was scrapping a plan to get England smoke free by 2030.

Ms Coffey, who is also Deputy Prime Minister, said she was “not aware” whether the target to get the adult smoking rate down to 5 per cent or under had been axed.

The Government promised to publish a tobacco control plan “later this year” but The Guardian said ministers are expected to break the commitment. Ms Coffey was unable to say whether this was the case or not, instead saying her priority is on her “ABCD” — ambulances, backlog, care, doctors and dentists — ambitions.

Her Labour shadow Wes Streeting said: “The Health Secretary is ‘unaware’ of a major plank of her own Government’s health policy because she spends... most of her time firefighting in Number 10. Clueless and hopeless.”

Leading medics say the Department of Health and Social Care will miss its target unless further action is taken.

Ms Coffey told LBC radio she did not know if the nation was on track “because I haven’t looked into this specific prevention policy”.

She would not say whether she was personally committed to the policy, saying: “I’m a Government minister so if that’s Government policy today then that’s what I agree with. I don’t have personal views on these...matters.”

Ms Coffey’s voting record shows she has been against measures to reduce smoking.

Asked by LBC’s Nick Ferrari why she had voted against legislation outlawing smoking in cars containing children in 2014, she responded: “I didn’t think it was the right thing to do to be telling parents how to handle the situation with their children.”

In other developments, the health minister told Sky News that she was confident nurses will not get a higher pay offer as they began a vote on strike action last Thursday.

Ms Coffey said she was “not anticipating” any changes to the 4 per cent pay rise that nurses had already been offered, just days after the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) ballot got underway.

Asked then that it seems a strike is inevitable, she said: “That’s a decision for nurses who decide how to vote in this next coming month.”

The RCN ballot closes on November 2.