Who: UK government
Where: United Kingdom
When: 29 January 2024
Law stated as at: 5 February 2024
What happened:
The UK government has published its response to its October 2023 consultation “Creating a smokefree generation and tackling youth vaping” and has confirmed its intention to bring forward new tobacco and vaping legislation.
A change to the age of sale for all tobacco products, cigarette papers and herbal smoking products will be made whereby anyone born on or after 1 January 2009 will never legally be sold tobacco. Proxy sales (purchasing tobacco products on behalf of someone who doesn’t satisfy this age requirement) will also be prohibited.
The government also plans to introduce a ban on the sale and supply of disposal vapes, whether they contain nicotine or not, “as soon as possible” but will allow for an implementation period of at least six months before any ban. Separately, new restrictions and regulation around all other vaping products are to be put in place, such as restricting flavours, point of sale and packaging for vaping products.
To enforce these changes, legislation will also permit local authorities to issue new £100 fixed penalty notices for breaches of age of sale restrictions for tobacco products and vapes.
Vaping: new restrictions and regulation
Currently, 69% of vapers are aged 11 to 17 and there is a concern that the marketing for these products is appealing to children. New powers are therefore going to be introduced to restrict and regulate the display of vapes, their packaging and flavours, to prevent the marketing of vaping to children.
The consultation’s call for evidence showed that flavours are one of the main reasons that vapes appeal to children, who appear attracted to the fruit and sweet flavours of vapes, both in taste and smell as well as how they’re described.
Other reasons include the fact that, unlike tobacco packing, vape packaging can include bright colours and use of imagery such as cartoons. Vape products are also currently allowed to be displayed at the point of sale, often close to sweets and confectionary. Both these aspects were seen as having the potential to encourage or entice children to start and continue vaping.
To address these concerns, the popular options identified by the consultation include:
- Restricting flavours by limiting how the vape is described, as opposed to limiting its ingredients, its characterising flavours (taste and smell) or a combination of these.
- Requiring that vapes must be kept behind the counter and cannot be on display, like tobacco products.
- Prohibiting the use of all imagery and colouring and branding (having standardised packaging) for both the vape packaging and the vape device.
The government has yet to indicate what form these restrictions will take and further consultation will take place on the nature of the new restrictions and how new powers will be applied through regulation.
Why this matters:
New government initiatives to curb youth vaping will bring increased scrutiny on how vaping products are marketed and advertised, with focus on ensuring they do not appeal to children.
The government’s consultation has identified that in particular, the flavours, use of bright colours and cartoon imagery as well as highly visible points of display in shops make vaping highly appealing to children. Manufacturers and advertisers of these products will want to be involved in any future consultation on the nature of restrictions to address these issues which will have an impact, at a minimum, on how they package, describe, display and ultimately advertise their products.
Looking further forward, it will be interesting to see how any new restrictions will balance the need to not market these products at children, while also ensuring that these products are sufficiently attractive and affordable to adults who wish to move from smoking traditional cigarettes to vaping products.
