The Association for Convenience Stores (ACS) has urged the UK Government to put a licensing system in place across England, Ireland and Wales that tackles the illicit trade without unduly restricting responsible retailers. This was in response to the Government’s publication of a call for evidence on the implementation of the Tobacco and Vapes Bill.
The Tobacco & Vapes Bill does not provide powers to implement a retail licensing scheme in Scotland. Instead, it amends Scotland’s Register of Tobacco and Nicotine Vapour Product Retailers so that it extends to nicotine products and herbal smoking products. The Scottish Government is not currently looking at implementing a licensing scheme.
The call for evidence, published today (October 8th) by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), seeks more detailed views on the tobacco and vaping market, the nature of products and how they’re manufactured, the proposal for a licensing system in England, Ireland and Wales, and the proposal for a product registration scheme in the UK.
In the call for evidence, the Government stated that it would move straight to the consultation phase on rules restricting the display, branding, colour and packaging of vaping products as well as the packaging of tobacco products.
ACS has previously called on the Government to ensure that any licensing system must focus on stopping rogue traders without introducing disproportionate burdens on responsible retailers.
The call for evidence sets out the following overall objectives for a licensing scheme in England, Wales and Northern Ireland:
- protect public health – to ensure that retailers and their practices are not posing any undue or excessive risk to the health of the public, particularly children
- prevent crime – to ensure that retailers do not pose any undue crime risk and that only law-abiding retailers can sell these products to the public
The Government is seeking views on all aspects of a licensing scheme, including how licenses are granted, how long they last, what the licensing conditions should be, and how the experience of other licensing schemes, such as those already in place for alcohol, can inform the process.
ACS chief executive James Lowman said: “The Tobacco and Vapes Bill will mark a significant change to the way that convenience retailers [in England, Ireland and Wales] work, not just in terms of age restricted sales policies and displays, but securing a licence to operate. We welcome the opportunity to respond to the call for evidence on behalf of local shops, and will continue to outline what we believe is an effective licensing system to increase compliance and stamp out the illicit trade.
“Unless properly structured, a licensing scheme for tobacco and vapes could result in responsible retailers of a wide range of products and services being subjected to more administrative burdens on or prevented from operating just because of their location. We are clear that the object of a new licencing scheme should be to clamp down on rogue sellers and the billions lost through illicit sales every year, but this must not come at the expense of legitimate businesses.”
ACS will be consulting with retailers ahead of a formal response to the call for evidence in due course.
The full call for evidence is available here.
You can respond to the call for evidence through the DHSC’s online survey. The call for evidence is open for eight weeks and will close at 11:59pm, 3rd December 2025. The Scottish Grocers’ Federation will submit a response on behalf of members.
