MPs vote for plain, standardised packs
Fresh has congratulated North East MPs who today voted in favour of plain, standardised tobacco packaging – and said the move will help make cigarettes history for more children.
367 MPs voted in favour of the measure with just 113 against, despite intense lobbying by the tobacco industry to sway politicians against the measure.
Standardised (“plain”) packaging will be introduced at the same time as the EU Tobacco Products Directive measures on packaging and labelling, increasing the size of the health warnings to 65% of the pack and putting picture warnings on the front of all packs, on 20th May 2016.
The move to prevent cigarettes being sold in glitzy packaging will help protect the next generation of children and young people from starting to smoke. Two thirds of current smokers started as children, and 1 in 2 lifetime North East smokers will die from a smoking related disease. 69% of North East adults support standardized packaging with less than 9% opposing.
Lisa Surtees, Acting Director of Fresh, said: “MPs have given young people the protection they deserve from tobacco marketing. No parent wants their child to smoke and there has been tremendous support for this from North East families, local authorities and the NHS.”
“There is such strong evidence that standardised packs would help make cigarette packs less attractive, especially to children and young people. The type of pack on shop shelves in Australia make the health warnings stand out more and are seen as less appealing and more toxic.
Deborah Arnott, Chief Executive of health charity ASH said:”The Government, and MPs from all parties, are to be congratulated for resisting the bully-boy tactics and misinformation of the tobacco industry and for implementing the most important public health reform of this Parliament.”
There is good evidence that standard packs will:
o Reduce the appeal of cigarettes and tobacco packs, especially to children and young people
o Make packs less misleading – colours like white can be mistaken to mean lower tar and less harmful
o Increase the impact of health warnings