Have your say on tobacco and vape packaging, appearance and display

The Government is proposing tougher rules on the packaging, appearance and display of tobacco and nicotine products to reduce their visibility and appeal to children. The key measures are:

• Requiring vapes, nicotine pouches and other nicotine products to be sold in plain white packaging and kept out of sight in shops.
• Restricting vape and nicotine product flavour names to simple single-word names (e.g. strawberry) and banning flavour descriptors that appeal to young people, such as sweets and deserts.
• Restricting the colour of vaping devices to black, white or grey and limiting promotional features and branding.
• Requiring all tobacco products, including cigars, cigarillos, smokeless tobacco, heated tobacco products and cigarette papers, to be sold in drab olive packaging with health warnings and kept out of sight in shops.
• Restricting the colour of heated tobacco devices to a drab olive (like cigarette packaging) and limiting promotional features and branding.

Some vape industry and consumer groups are mobilising opposition to the proposed vape regulations through the ‘SaveVaping’ campaign and lobbying through the media. The cigar industry has also mounted a campaign against plans to introduce standardised packaging for all tobacco products, and the industry-backed ‘SaveCigars’ campaign claims to have generated over 1,700 responses opposing the regulations.

This risks skewing the consultation responses and could undermine the Government's ability to use other powers in the Tobacco and Vapes Act.

We need a strong response from public health professionals, members of the public and young people to show how much support there is for the proposals. 

1. Go to the online survey. The link to respond is here.
2. You will be asked in what capacity you are responding to the survey. Select ‘an individual sharing my personal views and experiences’. 
3. You will be asked if you have any direct or indirect links to (or receive funding from) the tobacco industry. 
4. Respond to the personal info questions. While you can click, ‘prefer not to say’ your response will be stronger if you answer these questions.  
5. Use the short guide below to complete the survey. This should take 5-10 mins. Alternatively, you can just answer agree to all of the proposals to express your support. You can skip any sections you don’t want to answer, but we encourage you to answer all the questions as this will help to counter tobacco/vape industry-linked respondents who select disagree to all of the proposals.
6. Feel free to add comments to the free-text questions but this is entirely optional. Leaving the free-text boxes blank will not impact the validity of your overall response. 

Section 1: tobacco packaging

• Extend drab olive packaging and health warnings on cigarettes to all tobacco products, including cigars/cigarillos, smokeless tobacco, heated tobacco devices, herbal smoking products, and cigarette papers. 

• Introduce pack inserts (a piece of card with information about quitting smoking) in tobacco products.

Section 2: Heated tobacco device appearance

• Regulate the appearance of heated tobacco devices to reduce their appeal to children, including making them a drab olive colour and restricting lights, branding and screens.

Section 3: Vaping and nicotine product packaging and flavour descriptors

• Introduce plain white packaging for all nicotine products (including vapes and nicotine pouches) with limited branding and standardised product information.

• Restrict flavour descriptors to single-word recognisable food, drink or natural flavours (e.g. strawberry), excluding sweets, desserts, alcohol, soft/energy drinks, concepts and sensory terms (e.g. blast, cool, ice).

Section 4: Vape device appearance

• Regulate the appearance of vapes to reduce their appeal to children, including limiting device colour to black, white or grey and restricting lights, branding and screens. 

Section 5: Retail display: tobacco products

• Note: You will be asked if you want to answer questions on retail display in England, Wales and Northern Ireland AND/OR Scotland. Select the relevant option depending on your location. The summary below applies to the proposals for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. There are some minor differences for the Scottish proposals but the principle is the same. 

• Extend existing retail display rules for cigarettes requiring them to be sold from closed gantries to all tobacco and related products, including cigars/cigarillos, smokeless tobacco, heated tobacco devices, herbal smoking products, and cigarette papers. 

• Maintain the existing display exemption for trade premises and specialist tobacconists, enabling them to continue displaying tobacco products. 

• Remove the existing display exemption for bulk tobacconists and duty-free shops, putting tobacco products out of sight in these settings.

Section 6: Retail display: vapes and nicotine products

• Require vapes and other nicotine products like pouches to be sold from behind the counter in sealed gantries like cigarettes. 

• Trade premises that are only accessible to people that work in the nicotine trade would be exempted from these restrictions.

• Pharmacies in England, Wales and Scotland would have a partial exemption allow a limited display of vaping and nicotine products, for example in locked transparent display units, to support adult smoking cessation.

Section 7: Consultation stage impact assessments

• You will be asked if you want to answer questions on the consultation stage impact assessments.