Act now
The consultation closes at 11:59pm on 2 October 2026.
Grassroots campaign
Vaping is not smoking
Save Vaping is a campaign organised by the New Nicotine Alliance to oppose disproportionate restrictions in the UK government's consultation on tobacco and vapes packaging, appearance, and retail display. The campaign is aimed at adults who use reduced-risk alternatives, business owners and specialist retailers, and anyone who cares about proportionate, evidence-led harm reduction.
The government is consulting on proposals that could affect packaging, product and device appearance, flavour descriptors, and where vaping, heated tobacco, tobacco, and nicotine products can be displayed in shops. Rules designed to protect young people must not erase adult choice, confuse the difference between smoking and reduced-risk alternatives, or make it harder for smokers to switch. Please respond to the public consultation by 11:59pm on 2 October 2026 and write to your MP.
Harm reductionAdult choiceRetail impactProportionate rules
Write locally
Use the MP tool to turn national policy into constituency pressure and direct political cost.
What the government proposes
Packaging, appearance, and display rules could reshape adult access to reduced-risk products
The consultation covers UK-wide proposals on packaging, device appearance, flavour descriptors, and retail display for tobacco, vaping, heated tobacco, and nicotine products. That could affect adults who vape or use other reduced-risk alternatives, smokers who may be thinking of switching, and the retailers who provide legal products and practical advice.
Harm reduction must stay visible
Packaging and display rules must not make reduced-risk alternatives harder to understand, find, or distinguish from smoking.
Adults need clear choices
Adults who smoke should still be able to identify legal alternatives and understand how products differ before they switch.
Retailers will carry the burden
Specialist retailers and other lawful businesses will have to adapt displays, stock, advice, and customer journeys if rules go too far.
Youth protection must be proportionate
Protecting young people is important, but regulation should be targeted and should not punish adults who use reduced-risk products.
Why oppose overreach
Why we oppose disproportionate restrictions
The case is simple: rules should protect young people without undermining harm reduction, adult choice, specialist retailers, or clear risk communication.
Harm reduction
The consultation should not make reduced-risk alternatives look, feel, or function in public policy like smoking because:
- smokers need clear signals that switching away from combustible tobacco matters
- overly restrictive packaging or display rules could make legal alternatives harder to notice or understand
- policy should preserve the practical advantages that help adults move away from smoking
Harm reduction should remain a central test for any final regulation.
Adult choice
Adults should be able to make informed choices about legal products. Consultation responses can explain why:
- plain, responsible information can help smokers choose alternatives
- flavour names and packaging rules should not remove useful adult-facing information
- people with lived experience can describe what helped them switch and stay away from cigarettes
Adult choice and clear risk communication should not be collateral damage.
Retail impact
The consultation recognises that proposals can create business costs. Supporters and retailers should explain practical impacts such as:
- changes to displays, stock presentation, packaging, and customer information
- the effect on specialist shops that serve adults and provide product guidance
- the cumulative pressure of repeated regulation on lawful businesses
Rules should be workable for legitimate retailers and proportionate to the problem they are meant to solve.
Proportionate rules
Protecting children and young people is a legitimate aim, but the final rules should be targeted:
- measures should focus on youth appeal without blocking adult smokers from finding alternatives
- vaping and reduced-risk products should not be regulated as if they are the same as cigarettes
- the government should consider less restrictive options where they would achieve the same aim
Proportionate policy can protect young people and still support adult harm reduction.
Take action
Two actions matter most right now
If you oppose disproportionate restrictions, the two most important steps are to respond to the consultation and write to your MP.
Respond to the consultation
Send a response to the Department of Health and Social Care consultation on tobacco and vapes packaging, appearance, and display. Explain why proportionate rules matter and how reduced-risk products can help adults move away from combustible tobacco.
Write to your MP
Use the postcode lookup to find the right constituency and copy a message you can adapt around adult choice, harm reduction, retail impact, and proportionate youth protection.
What experts say
These approved statements give wider harm-reduction context for why policy should distinguish smoking from reduced-risk alternatives.
"However, if this approach also makes e-cigarettes less easily accessible, less palatable or acceptable, more expensive, less consumer friendly or pharmacologically less effective, or inhibits innovation and development of new and improved products, then it causes harm by perpetuating smoking."
"International peer-reviewed evidence indicates that the risk to the health of bystanders from exposure to e-cigarette vapour is extremely low."
"e-cigarette use is not covered by smokefree legislation and should not routinely be included in the requirements of an organisation's smokefree policy."
"Distinguish between smoking and vaping: Conflating vaping with smoking is harmful to health."
"It is very important that smokefree legislation does not include vaping. Vaping is a harm reduction approach for adult smokers trying to quit smoking. Policies that deal with smoking and vaping in the same way send a very confusing message."
"Helping people switch from smoking to vaping should be considered a priority if the Government is to achieve a smoke-free 2030 in England."
"While health risks of e-cigarettes to vapers themselves have been estimated at up to 5% of health risks of smoking, health risks to bystanders are most likely reduced by a much bigger margin, and most likely altogether. This is because e-cigarettes release no chemicals into the environment themselves, only what users exhale, and such exhalation has so far not been shown to generate any toxicants at levels that could conceivably affect the health of bystanders."
"perceiving vaping as equally or more harmful than smoking predicted subsequent relapse to smoking among adult former smokers"
"our findings that vaping carries a small fraction of the health risks of smoking, suggest that smokers should be encouraged to use vaping products for stopping smoking"
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Sign up as an NNA supporter or donate to support its work.
Final action
Take the argument into your constituency.
Once someone understands why disproportionate packaging, appearance, and display restrictions could undermine harm reduction and adult choice, the next step is simple: find their MP, personalise the message, and apply pressure locally.