Every year on World No Tobacco Day, the World Health Organisation gives out medals to people who have made outstanding contributions to tobacco control.

There were just six awards given out in Europe, and one of them was to Liberal Democrat MP for Bristol West, Stephen Williams, who was nominated by two organisations, Action on Smoking and Health and Smokefree South West.

He was presented with the medal by Health Minister Anna Soubry today. The Minister backed his campaign for plain packaging of cigarettes.

Since he was elected in 2005, Stephen has worked on a number of tobacco related issues. These include:

This includes:

• Playing a leading role in the campaign to persuade the Coalition government to introduce plain, standardised packaging of tobacco products
• Pushing for 100% smokefree legislation when the Government of the day was considering exemptions for bars & clubs
• Initiating a series of inquiries into tobacco issues

On receiving his medal, he said:

I am absolutely delighted to be recognised by the World Health Organisation for my work on smoking and health and thank those who nominated me. I have been campaigning for increased tobacco control since I entered Parliament in 2005, starting with the smoking ban and more recently the campaign for standardised packaging of cigarettes.

I will use this World No Tobacco Day award to step up my fight to ensure the Government does all it can to protect our citizens from the harms of tobacco.

ASH described him as an exemplary chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group while Smokefree Southwest said it was fantastic to have such a strong voice in Bristol.

He even received an accolade from the Prime Minister. You know how sometimes BBC’s Question Time seems like the Nigel Farage Show, well, PMQs almost seems like the Julian Huppert Show. I’m not sure I’ve seen an MP be quite as successful at Julian at being called in that session. Anyway, Julian asked the PM to congratulate Stephen and back his campaign for plain packaging. The PM replied:

I am afraid I missed the beginning of the question, so I did not quite hear who got the medal—[Interruption.] Oh, the hon. Gentleman gave a magnificent introduction to the Queen’s Speech, and I commend him for his medal.