The smoking ban just passed. Your cereal aisle didn't get the memo

Parliament just did something I've been cheering on for years.

Anyone born after 1 January 2009 will never legally buy a cigarette in this country. Not next year. Not at 40. Never.

Wes Streeting called it a historic moment. Baroness Merron called it the biggest public health intervention in a generation.

As an ambassador to the Public Health Collaboration, I agree. Prevention beats cure every single time.

But here's what's bugging me.

My parents were both diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. My father went on to develop Alzheimer's. Both conditions have strong links to ultra-processed food. Watching them decline is what pulled me into this fight in the first place.

Smoking kills around 80,000 people a year in the UK. That's tragic. And that's exactly why this bill matters.

Now look at what's sitting on the other end of the scales.

Roughly 60% of the average Brit's calories now come from ultra-processed food. Children eat even more. Research links that stuff to heart disease, type 2 diabetes, obesity, cancer, dementia, and early death.

The crisps. The cereals. The ready meals. The fizzy drinks. The "healthy" snacks with 30 ingredients your grandmother wouldn't recognise. The cartoon characters staring at your grandkids in aisle 4.

Here's the uncomfortable truth. Ultra-processed foods are engineered to be addictive, in the same way cigarettes were. Flavour chemists, texture specialists, marketing millions. All designed to make you reach for another packet.

Tobacco took a generation of political will to tackle. Decades of warnings, advertising bans, plain packaging, and finally a lifetime ban.

Ultra-processed food has had none of that.

Therefore the job falls to us. Parents, grandparents, you and me.

Celebrate yesterday's win. Then start your own ban, in your own kitchen, on the next generation of addictive products Parliament hasn't caught up with yet.