Packaging news
Saturday, May 20, 2017 at 14:58 
So after all the huffing and puffing we finally got there.
From this weekend smokers will no longer be able to buy packs with fewer than 20 cigarettes or pouches of rolling tobacco smaller that 30g.
Previously you could buy 10g pouches so you now have to buy three times as much.
If you're trying to reduce your consumption without going cold Turkey you'll now have to buy the larger pack and do your best to resist temptation.
ASH says the measure is justified because "It has a greater effect on younger people and those on low incomes, as for obvious reasons, they’re more sensitive to price."
Or, in the words of director of policy Hazel Cheeseman, "It will hit poorer smokers harder." Nice.
Other regulations include larger, more gruesome health warnings. Not only does this suggest the previous graphic warnings weren't working, it also begs the question, what's next?
At this point I could suggest something in very poor taste but it might put ideas into their heads. After all, graphic health warnings were considered shocking once but it didn't stop their introduction when other policies failed to produce the desired results.
Bizarrely, while smaller tobacco packs and pouches have been outlawed, vapers are today coming to terms with the fact that the maximum volume of e-liquid available for purchase legally is now restricted to 10ml.
The nicotine strength of e-liquids is restricted to 20mg/ml, and e-cigarette tanks are restricted to no more than 2ml.
In addition, labelling requirements on e-cigarette products now include a warning about nicotine being addictive even though nicotine itself is relatively harmless and there is very little evidence that (a) non-smokers are vaping, or (b) vaping is a gateway to tobacco.
The whole thing is a complete mess but that's regulators for you.
Then there's plain packaging which is a classic example of the UK government gold-plating EU regulations.
I'd like to think Brexit will produce fewer regulations but I'm not convinced it will. Regulators regulate.
Anyway I've said all I want to say about plain packaging (we've been campaigning on this issue since 2011) but I'll just echo something Chris Snowdon wrote yesterday:
All the smokers I know have reacted to the new packs with a shrug of the shoulders. The notion that changing the colour of the pack will reduce the appeal of what’s inside is as risible as it ever was and some of the new graphic warnings cause genuine mirth (the baby with the cigarette dummy is a particular favourite).
Actually, the Friends of Forest Facebook page features some fairly tasty comments by aggrieved smokers but, by and large, the smokers I've talked to or heard on the radio have also been pretty phlegmatic.
Plain packs certainly won't stop them smoking and we're still waiting for evidence from Australia (where plain packs were introduced more than four years ago) that they've had any impact on youth smoking rates.
Talking of which, when tobacco control campaigners refer to "young people" don't be fooled into thinking they mean children.
The term may include teenagers but it's now a catch-all expression covering people well into their twenties.
Last night, on Five Live, I was on with a specialist in paediatrics who appeared to argue that because our brains continue to develop until we're 25 anyone below that age is vulnerable.
I think he was referring to addictive substances including nicotine but I'd have to listen again. It explains however his espousal of the cautionary principle, which he applied even to e-cigarettes.
The point is, the age restriction on tobacco sales has risen from 16 to 18, at which point we are legally said to be adults.
In many US states however it's illegal to smoke (or drink alcohol) below the age of 21.
Now we're being told that our brains continue to develop – and are vulnerable to addictive substances – as late as 25.
Do you see where I'm going with this? Increasingly we're being spun the idea that anyone below the age of 25 is 'vulnerable' to nicotine, alcohol and so on.
Below that age you will be treated like a child and subjected to increasing restrictions on anything considered harmful to "young people".
Finally, I hope the folks at ASH are enjoying a little rest and recuperation this weekend. They were so excited, "counting down" the days and hours to full implementation of the Tobacco Products Directive and plain packaging, I imagine they could hardly sleep with excitement.
Odd, I know, but packaging does that to some people.
Update: Regarding the new regs, you can read Forest's reaction here:
Cigarettes sold in plain green packs under new rules (BBC News)
New cigarettes packaging rules come into force (ITV News)
Stricter cigarette packaging rules come into force in UK (Guardian)
Plain cigarette packs 'milestone' as critics claim policy treats smokers like 'naughty children' (The Herald)
All cigarettes must be sold in standardised green packets from tomorrow (Press Association)
Update: Pat Nurse has also being doing her bit. Pat was on Five Live Breakfast with Hazel Cheeseman of ASH this morning.
To listen click here. The discussion starts around 1:08.
Reader Comments (13)
All this under a Tory Government, unbelievable.
At least we don't live in the dystopia imagined by George Orwell in his novel '1984'.
In it, Winston Smith had to put up with standardised packaging of cigarettes. No branding variations, just a government mandated 'Victory' brand. A totalitarian government that saw behaviour modification as an important part of its role and which regarded non-smoking as virtuous.
Winston Smith ponders this and more in part 1 chapter 5 of the book as he sits smoking in the canteen at work. One of the last cigarettes from his meagre ration of 100 grammes of tobacco a week.
(1) Under-25s will be treated as children? In today's 'caring' Britain, EVERYONE is already treated like children.
(2) Public reaction to 'plain' packs: despite being a smoker's paradise compared to most places, Berlin now has them too. I was waiting behind a woman in the local tobacconists as she was pointing to the shelves and just referring to the pictures instead of brands: 'No, not the hole in the throat, the one with the kid on it'. Both customer and tobacconist had a laugh. I used to wonder why more people weren't using cigarette cases (as I've been doing for 20 years) but now I think they just don't give a damn, the propaganda has reached such an overkill level that they don't even really see it.
TobCon's mantra is that cigarette packs must be made less appealing to "young people."
In the UK, minors are already prohibited from buying cigarettes, which must already be hidden from public view in retail establishments. So in order for a "young person" to ever lay eyes on a cigarette pack, she must already have gone out of her way to procure one. It would stand to reason, then, that her decision to smoke has long since been made, and is unlikely to be affected by whatever medico-porn the pack happens to be festooned with.
The point being, TobCon's lies (the ones they invent for their own rhetorical benefit, no less) don't even stand up to a basic level of real-world scrutiny. They just dream up new and more sociopathic ways of punishing smokers for smoking, and use other people's children as convenient human shields when someone has the temerity to call them out on it.
Gary
I don't think the current government has much of a choice, it's not a case of if they implement a new anti-tobacco law, but when.
Brussels, 16 June 2003
EU among first to sign Convention on Tobacco Control
"Health and Consumer Protection Commissioner David Byrne and the Greek Council Presidency are among the first to sign in Geneva today the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) on behalf of the European Union."
http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-03-847_en.htm
Tobacco and the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control
Q&A
“There are 180 Parties to the Convention, which is legally binding, meaning that Parties are required to take incremental action to prevent tobacco consumption, marketing and exposure, among many other measures.”
http://www.who.int/features/qa/tobacco/en/
16. Plain packaging.
http://www.who.int/fctc/guidelines/article_13.pdf
Good point by Joe Jackson above in the comments on why don't more people use cigarette cases.
As far as I'm concerned, this is officially a 'declaration of war' to smokers by the government-pharma establishment. The last bit of objective information (tar&nicotine levels) has been removed, the packs are now fully covered in propaganda (text+image). It's extremely naive in my opinion to believe that the psychopaths that are behind this or approve of it are concerned about smokers' health and welfare.
As for the end of 10cig packs...they were more expensive on a cig basis anyway. Smokers should be saving a lot of money by stopping any donation to all the so called health charities that are behind this monstrosity (CROOK, BHF and the rest) and by minimizing any contact with the sickness industry. This is additional to what they've been saving on going out expenses since the smoking ban.
At the same time the Labour Party manifesto proposes lowering the voting age to 16.
Plain packaging is a propaganda tool designed to amplify the persecution of smokers. It hasn't been demonstrated to cut smoking rates yet it is increasingly being applied worldwide as a consequence of signing the FCTC.
The FCTC must be destroyed. Every time we point out the fallacies of tobacco control we erode their domination. We must keep up resistance to the neo-totalitarians.
In related news the 'slippery slope' is alive and well. This new article at the Daily Mail demonstrates that neo-totalitarian lifestyle control impulses are growing. "Burgers should be BANNED on buses and trains to fight Britain’s growing obesity crisis say experts" http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4524702/Burgers-BANNED-buses-fight-obesity.html#ixzz4heeO7loQ
Tobacco control was the first step...
Just stocked up on my cigs for the year after spending another hol in Greece 4.50euro for a pack of 20, gone up 50cent since last year, and lo and behold these packs which I've just seen for the first time have the dreaded pictures of holes in bodies on my slim packs and a man lying on a bed with a tube stuck in his gob on the ordinary size ones, wont put me off, but give me a plain pack any day, as long as they have the brand I want in plain sight.
Ann, the medico-porn on all tobacco products is an EU directive. Greece had no option but to comply. It won't, however, make one iota of difference to the Greeks, save that there may be an uptick in cigarette case sales.
Tobacco has gone up horrendously here, but not at the instigation of any Tobacco Control lobby (they are thankfully not a major force here) but because the Greek government is taxing everything until the pips squeak in a desperate attempt to placate their masters in Brussels. My GV tobacco was €4.80 for 30g a couple of years ago. It's now 7.50 for the same pack.
I've kept my original packs so that I can decant from the unhallowed plain packaging. No political party gets my support. Spoiled vote form from now on. The political party is dead due to infestation of health fanatics.
Medico-porn is an apt description all right! Yes the Greeks are being crippled with austerity measures by the EU.