Smokers bring in £15bn to UK Treasury

Smoking is worth almost £15 billion to the public purse because of the tax revenue and the savings from smokers’ early deaths, according to a think tank’s analysis.

The free market Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) calculated the cost of smoking at £4.6bn, including treating diseases, tidying up dropped cigarette butts and putting out house fires.

But tobacco duties brought in £9.5bn a year and the government saves £9.8bn in pension, healthcare and other benefit payments because of the premature deaths of smokers.

The think tank accused politicians of “scapegoating” smokers, drinkers and the obese, claiming the £24.7bn revenue from “sin taxes” far outweighed the costs they impose on the public finances.

“Taken together, Britain’s public finances would be £22.8bn worse off if there were no drinking, smoking or obesity,” the IEA research paper said.

The report’s co-author, Christopher Snowdon, head of lifestyle economics at the IEA, said: “We are constantly being told that people who choose to drink, smoke or eat too much are a burden.

“Smokers, drinkers and those who are obese actually provide a net benefit to the public finances, so vilifying them in the quest to make savings is futile.”