Overview
- Health leaders opened a 12-week consultation on Thursday proposing plain packs for vape devices, restricting device colours to white, black or grey, requiring simple flavour names and keeping products out of sight in shops.
- The proposals would also extend plain-pack and display rules to other tobacco products and remove duty-free and airport exemptions for visible tobacco displays.
- Officials cited recent evidence and polling when launching the consultation, including a UCL/KCL study showing standardised packs reduce youth interest and an ASH poll reporting about 19% of 11–17-year-olds have tried vaping.
- Senior health figures and child health groups backed the move, saying colourful branding and sweet-sounding flavour names drive youth uptake and that stronger regulation is needed to prevent nicotine addiction among children.
- The consultation is a policy-design step, not a law, and the government will weigh responses from the public, retailers and manufacturers before any formal rules are drafted, a process that could change shop layouts and product marketing if enacted.