Sticking to its Guns

Time:2024-01-30 Views:399

The U.K. government believes that vapes comprise an important tool for helping adults quit

tobacco smoking, a position its delegation will put forward during COP10, according to Dame

Andrea Leadsom, the parliamentary under-secretary of state for health and social care.

Leadsom was speaking on Jan. 18 at Westminster during a backbench debate organised by MP

Andrew Lewer and aimed at uncovering what stance the government would take at COP10, the

10th Conference of the Parties to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on

Tobacco Control, which is due to be held in Panama on Feb. 5-10.

Lewer, and others who spoke during the debate, were concerned that COP10 might resolve to

establish equivalence in the regulation of combustible cigarettes and reduced-risk

products, thus undermining the U.K.’s successful strategy of using vapes to help smokers

quit their habit. Their concerns had been inflamed because previously they had been unable

to wring from the government information about who would go to Panama as part of the U.K.’

s delegation and what positions they would take.

Leadsom said the U.K. delegation would be led by the U.K.’s deputy chief medical officer,

Jeanelle de Gruchy, but gave only a rough overview of the U.K.’s position. Referring to

the discussions that would take place about progress on tobacco control worldwide, she said

the U.K. was an outlier on the topic of vapes, and would be putting forward its position

that vapes were a very important tool for helping adults to quit. The U.K. government would

welcome other parties going further on tobacco control, but it would be monitoring the

negotiations to ensure that “nothing becomes mandatory.”

On novel and emerging tobacco products, said Leadsom, different parties took different

approaches. Currently, the U.K. was still looking at issues around heated tobacco, so the

U.K. delegation would be in listening mode in this respect.

She said the U.K. had no plans to implement further restrictions on advertising and

sponsorship, and she said that it would be pressing for no increase to be made in assessed

FCTC contributions.

This last point was likely to have been in response to concerns expressed by some during

the debate that while the U.K. was a major contributor to the FCTC, it seemed diffident in

its approach to tobacco COPs. It was suggested that U.K. taxpayers might end up paying for

policies that ran counter to their interests.

This was perhaps something of a concern because the debate never got to grips with the

issues of how COP proposals could be blocked by individual parties, and, if they were not

blocked, whether they were binding on all parties. The latter issue would not be so

worrisome currently because the U.K. government has shown itself to be relaxed in its

approach to complying with international agreements and laws, but it might become more of

an issue if the current government is replaced in this election year.