Cigar-chomping PM Winston Churchill would have supported smoking ban, says ... trends now
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He smoked up to 10 cigars a day and reportedly once likened enjoying the fragrant rolled tobacco to falling in love.
Winston Churchill's enjoyment of a fine Havana is the stuff of legend and he was repeatedly pictures with one gripped in his pugnacious jaw. He even has a line named after him.
But a senior minister has suggested the legendary wartime leader and Tory icon would have backed Rishi Sunak's plan for a smoking ban.
Health Secretary Victoria Atkins used Churchill to hit back at party critics of the plan for a rolling age limit on using tobacco, amid claims that the legislation is 'unconservative'.
Boris Johnson and Liz Truss have led a fightback against the law, which returns to the Commons this week, with Mr Johnson saying it is 'nuts' and asking a Canadian conference why 'the party of Winston Churchill wants to ban cigars'.
But writing in the Telegraph today, the Health Secretary said: 'Is this policy Conservative, some have asked? I profoundly believe it is. In doing so I draw inspiration from the words of a brilliant former Daily Telegraph correspondent, who became our greatest prime minister.
'I am referring, of course, to Winston Churchill, who once wrote of his relief from passing from 'the tossing sea of Cause and Theory to the firm ground of Result and Fact'.
She added: 'One of the foundations of the Conservative Party is that we take tough decisions to protect future generations. That applies to the burdens of debt
