Thank you for your statement, Minister, and for kindly providing a briefing to opposition spokespeople ahead of the introduction of the Bill. Wales has one of the best health services in the world, yet we also have some of the poorest health in Europe, and we must do whatever we can to address this. UKIP welcome the introduction of the Public Health (Wales) Bill, and we look forward to working with all parties in the Chamber to scrutinise and improve the Bill.

I welcome the introduction of a national register of tobacco and nicotine products, and its intention to uphold restrictions on selling such products to children and young people. We hope the register will also help to regulate the e-cigarette market. Currently, there is nothing stopping any person from cooking up batches of e-cig fluid in a bathtub and selling it at a local market, car boot sale or from a trolley on the high street. While I believe that e-cigarettes are a much safer alternative to traditional tobacco products and that the vast majority of retailers are responsible, end users have no surety that the product they are buying is safe. They simply do not know what the fluid they are buying contains or the conditions in which it was made. Minister, what consideration have you given to using the public health Bill to regulate the production of e-cigarette fluids?

Bought from a reputable source, e-cigarettes are orders of magnitude, safer than smoking traditional cigarettes, and, while it is preferable that smokers quit altogether, the reality is that many will not, even after accessing the Welsh Government’s gold-standard smoking-cessation schemes. Therefore, it is highly preferable that those smokers move to the much safer e-cigarettes. Public Health England advocate the use of e-cigarettes as an alternative to smoking and issue guidance to employers stating they may consider allowing people to use e-cigarettes at work if it is part of a policy to help tobacco smokers kick the habit. As we currently have 19 per cent of the adult population of Wales who smoke, we should be considering every avenue open to us to reduce the number. Minister, Public Health England and the Royal College of Physicians state that e-cigarettes are 95 per cent safer than smoking tobacco. Therefore, what consideration have you given to using this Bill to reverse some of the bans we have seen being introduced on e-cigarettes?

On other aspects of the Bill, we welcome moves to regulate special procedures and intimate piercing. The inclusion of health impact assessments is most welcome. I look forward to receiving greater detail on the impact pharmaceutical needs assessments will have in rural areas during Stage 1 scrutiny in committee.

Finally, Minister, we question the introduction of local toilet strategies. Without adequate access to public toilets, many disabled people, older people and people with health conditions are unable to leave their home. The British Toilet Association estimates that there are 40 per cent fewer public toilets in the UK than there were 10 years ago. We should place a duty on local authorities to either provide public toilets or ensure adequate public access to toilets, not simply drawing up a strategy. Minister, will you consider strengthening this part of the Bill? Thank you once again, Minister, for your statement, and I look forward to working with you to ensure that we deliver a Bill that delivers real public health benefits for Wales. Diolch yn fawr.