Illegal Vapes

Debate between Kirsten Oswald and Gareth Johnson

Tuesday 16th January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Mark. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson) for securing the debate and for the powerful way he introduced the topic.

Like the hon. Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson), I have made no secret of my lack of enthusiasm for vapes—specifically disposable vapes. I have held my own debates on the topic, and I have supported others, including the hon. Lady, so I am pleased to speak today, because we need urgent action on these things.

We have heard about smoking cessation a couple of times during the debate. Smoking cessation is absolutely important, and we should all take it very seriously, but disposable vapes are not risk-free, as has been pointed out. There are other, more useful ways of supporting smoking cessation—for instance, reusable vapes, which are not seen as attractive to young people. However we look at it, and whether they are illicit or not, disposable vapes are harmful, particularly to young people and our environment.

The environmental side of things is what first caused me to become interested in disposable vapes. That was thanks to Laura Young, better known as “Less Waste Laura”, who is a student from my constituency. Laura has worked tirelessly to rid our streets, parks and beaches of the discarded plastic, which is so familiar to us all, and the pollution that has become a torrent in recent years. These apparently disposable vapes are almost never properly disposed of; in fact, the way they are constructed means it is almost impossible to properly dispose of them even if someone wants to, which is quite unlikely, considering that this product is sold on the basis of its easily disposable nature.

It is a great pity—this is embarrassing for it—that the Labour party, propped up by the Tory party on East Renfrewshire Council, is so unwilling to support anything the SNP supports that it has, not once but twice, refused to support a motion to ban disposable vapes locally, putting the council out of step with almost every other local authority in Scotland and with the evidence of the harm that such devices do.

[Gareth Johnson]

Does the hon. Lady not accept that properly and legally produced disposable vapes provide an attractive alternative for adults to stop smoking and thereby save lives? Some companies, although this is not happening a great deal, can now almost fully recycle the components of disposable e-cigarettes. Does she accept that there is a danger that we move from illicit vapes and start targeting those that would be welcome for adult smokers to switch to?

[Kirsten Oswald]

No, I do not accept the hon. Gentleman’s proposition at all. That is absolutely wrong-headed. We can see in front of our eyes that these products are so attractive to young people that they are hooking them in—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman is mumbling from his chair. If I can finish my speech, I will set out for him that these products are hooking young people in and getting them addicted, and some of these young people then go on to start smoking. That is far from the situation he laid out, and we should take a very serious attitude to these products.

I have spoken about the harms caused by legal vapes to the planet, whether it is plastic, overuse of precious metals or fires. We have heard today about the impact that these substances have on the young people who ingest them, which should be of significant concern to us. Vaping is popular among young people. Since 2021, there has been a more than sevenfold increase in the number of 11 to 17-year-olds vaping and using disposable vapes rather than reusable ones. These devices are colourful and attractive, with snazzy names and fruity flavours. Vaping has risen so rapidly among children that one in five are now using disposable vapes.

We are not speaking about a smoking cessation mechanism. We are speaking about something that health professionals increasingly warn about. They are increasingly worried about a generation of young people who are hooked on nicotine. As the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health has said:

“Youth vaping is fast becoming an epidemic”.

Despite all that, and despite the fact that the public would be concerned to know all these things, we have this stream of illicit, and other, vapes on our streets. We know that local shops are the most likely source for young people to come by them, and we have heard quite a lot about that today. There is also the online space, which is a source of significant concern to me. Unregulated and untested products are coming via the online space, and we have no idea what harms will be caused to the young people consuming them.

I met a business owner from my area last week, and she talked me through her concerns about illegal medical products—obviously not proper medical products. She showed me how she was targeted by online accounts pushing these goods to her. She is a responsible professional and she resisted, but let us be clear that there are many and complex routes by which these illicit vapes arrive here, just as there are for illicit medical products. All those routes need to be closed down, and they need to be closed down now. Whatever the disposable vape, it causes harm.

We know that there are significant kinds of harm being caused with the flavours and the colours. We have heard from the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart) about the worries that Action on Smoking and Health spoke about. We are hearing more and more about vape use being glamourised online, and when people under the legal age cannot purchase vapes legally, they are purchasing them illegally or purchasing illegal ones.

The public health messaging on this issue is not as clear as it should be. The hon. Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) tried to tell me that vapes would be a perfectly reasonable way to expect adults to support themselves in smoking cessation, but that is not right and that should not be what the public health messaging tells us. We heard from the hon. Member for Darlington that vapes are a gateway to other, sometimes very serious, concerns and to riskier behaviour, such as smoking and substance abuse. He eloquently outlined the even greater and more significant harms that can be caused.

These things are arriving in huge numbers. I am grateful to the Advertising Standards Authority, which met with me after the most recent vape-related debate I spoke in. It is doing significant work trying to uphold the ban on advertising in various places, including on social media, of nicotine-containing cigarettes that are not licensed as medicines. None the less, Members may have seen adverts that would cause them to think that was not the case, and that is part of this torrent and this pushing of vapes, which needs our urgent attention.

Indeed, vapes need attention across the world. Let us be clear that the scale of the problem and the potential harms to young people and the planet should cause us deep worry. I read a really interesting piece by Chris Kirkham from Reuters last month about the owners of Elf Bar, which is a company with roots in China. Elf Bar products are very popular here, and the company is now, according to Reuters, flooding the US with illegal vapes—ones not covered by Food and Drug Administration regulations.

Disposable Vapes: Environmental Impact

Debate between Kirsten Oswald and Gareth Johnson

Tuesday 29th November 2022 Westminster Hall

[Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this debate. There is no doubt that this is an issue, but vaping has saved thousands of lives in this country. The more we can encourage smokers to move from tobacco on to vaping, the more lives will be saved. I would like to impress on the hon. Lady how important it is in a debate such as this that we do not tarnish the reputation of vaping to the point where we put off smokers from switching over to it, which has to be a positive thing.

[Kirsten Oswald]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making that point, because it reinforces one of my earlier points. I absolutely support any and all attempts to stop smoking, and all supports that assist people. That is really important. We all know the harm that tobacco does, but I point the hon. Gentleman to the comments I have cited from bodies such as the World Health Organisation, which has concerns about the road to tobacco.

We need a nuanced approach. For instance, I would be interested in having a further conversation and seeing more research on vapes that are not disposable. I think that is a conversation worth having. I am not here to say that no one should ever use vapes; that is absolutely not my aim. My aim is to look specifically at disposable vapes and ask whether we are travelling down the right path.

We have heard about the number of young people who are vaping and the concerns about the move to tobacco, which the hon. Gentleman and I are both very concerned about because of the health implications. Are we really expecting the same young people to have a disposable vape, use it and then get themselves to a recycling centre, so that they can properly dispose of them? To me, that seems somewhat unlikely, to say the least. It is really important that we try to separate the two issues, because they are both really important, and all discussions about smoking cessation should be serious and taken seriously.

In addition to the disposal of such vapes, which I will come to a little later, we should obviously be concerned by their acquisition and use in the first place. I am really concerned and perplexed—this is perhaps a sign of my age—by reports of younger people who have never smoked but are now vaping. I just do not understand that, because I am not a young person, but I suspect that the hon. Gentleman and I would agree that this is not the direction of travel that we want to see. We want people to stop smoking, to be supported to do that, and not to move in a different direction.

As I said, I am not here today to take issue with vaping per se. I would like to see more research into the topic as a whole, but I am suggesting that having far fewer disposable vapes is going to be an immediate necessity, because of the damaging waste that is being created by the use of these devices. Reusable vapes might fill some of the gaps, should that be necessary, but I am really concerned about the environmental impact of the disposable vape industry, and there is a bit of a vacuum where there should be scrutiny on that topic. Regardless of our various views on the issue, we would probably all accept that having a bit of scrutiny would be sensible.

I recently used a written parliamentary question to ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment had been made of the environmental impact of vaping products. The answer was none—no environmental assessment at all. Nobody who has seen the sheer quantity of cast-off disposable vapes will think that is acceptable. I do not think that is okay, and we need to up our game quickly. Disposable vapes are fundamentally electrical items, and they contain precious metals such as lithium. We should know in this day and age that lithium is a critical material for our green transition, but it is simply going to waste in devices that are not being disposed of properly.

Disposable vapes are also another unnecessary single use of plastic, which is a material that, along with the batteries and the nicotine that disposable vapes contain, is hazardous to the environment and wildlife when littered. I have heard numerous reports of pets and wildlife in marine areas being affected by this new type of plastic waste. According to the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, if a battery is disposed of incorrectly—remember that almost all of them are disposed of incorrectly—heavy metals might leak into the ground when the battery casing corrodes. That can cause soil and water pollution, and it can endanger wildlife and human health. Again, most of the vapes are disposed of incorrectly, so this is not a theoretical issue.

I am grateful to the UK Vaping Industry Association for getting in touch with me when it learned that I had secured this debate, and it made some valid points about how some people successfully stop smoking via vaping, as we have heard, and I do not take away from that in any way. However, I was a bit disappointed by the argument that under-age concerns are not exclusive to vapes. I agree with that—it is absolutely true—but I do not think that is really the point, and it cannot be the case that we cannot look for urgent action because it could put people off stopping smoking. It cannot be beyond us both to support smoking cessation in a practical and meaningful way, and to stop making such a colossal mess of the planet.

In all of this, there must be a really important role for manufacturers, and the industry as a whole, in pushing forward better ways to operate. They do not need to wait for someone to make them do the right thing; they could do the right thing and do better right now, and I am sure we would all be very grateful. I was surprised to hear comments from the vape manufacturer Riot on a recent BBC Radio 5 Live show. When pressed about the actual rate of recycling of its products, its representative said that it was in fractions of 1%. I absolutely respect the company for taking the time to engage with this discussion, which is really important, but that tiny wee recycling rate is the reality.

That is the crux of the problem, why we are having the debate and why we are seeing all these things lying around. People are simply not recycling them because it is too hard, because they do not know how, and because the things are not ideally set up to be recycled. We have to be realistic about that. We just about need a degree in vape decommissioning to work out what to do, where to go and how to go about it. Dealing properly with what are meant to be disposable items of convenience—that is their unique selling point—is actually a monumental inconvenience to their users. Manufacturers know that, but they seem much more interested in making sales than stopping the obvious waste issues that arise from them.

To get an idea of what we are talking about, at the moment the discarded disposables mean that 10 tonnes of lithium are sent to landfill every year. We must remember that this is a growing market and that those are only the bits that are being sent to landfill, not the bits that are being thrown around the place. That is already at a level equivalent to the lithium batteries inside 1,200 electric vehicles.

Concerns are also growing about what that means more broadly. Some people suggest that the material is likely to contribute to fires at landfill sites, so a range of investigations needs to take place. Indeed, it is no wonder that 18 groups that advocate on environmental and health issues recently wrote an open letter to the UK Government, published by Green Alliance, looking for a ban on disposable vapes. I am grateful to all the organisations, which include Surfers Against Sewage, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, Wildlife and Countryside Link and others. It is really important that we look at the matter. We need to very seriously take on board the points those organisations make about the importance of not squandering our precious resources, such as lithium, in such a cavalier and unthinking way.

The organisations are also correct that there is “a huge waste issue” associated with disposable vapes. In Scotland, we are moving towards a circular economy and a waste-free society. We have ambitious targets for recycling, but as part of that, specific guidance on how to recycle vapes is increasingly vital. What will the UK Government do to make the whole process easier? I know that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs says that the UK Government will set out plans for reforming the existing waste electrical and electronic equipment regulations “in due course”. “In due course” needs to come now, because there is a clear and significant environmental impact, there is uncertainty and confusion, and that allows concerted inaction on the issue to take root. What are the UK Government doing to help be part of and drive forward the conversation on how vaping markets are targeting our young people? How are we going to act on plastic waste and pollution and on the failure of any proper recycling strategy for lithium batteries?

Failure to act means we are knowingly causing damage to our environment. It means that precious resources, such as lithium, which are finite and dangerous when disposed of improperly are not being properly managed. The situation has arrived at pace; it has all come upon us quite quickly. However, we need to deal with it in the same way. We need to get a move on and try and work out the best way forward for the planet and the people who use vapes. We either sort the situation out so disposable vapes are really disposable, with proper recycling not only theoretically possible but practically happening, or we get rid of them altogether. None of us can afford for things to carry on as they are.

[Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)]

I did not intend to speak so I apologise, Mrs Murray, for catching you unawares and for not informing the hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Kirsten Oswald) that I was going to speak. I found her speech fascinating, so I did not want to continuously interrupt it with endless interventions. I do not agree with all her points, but she highlights a general issue with littering and plastic wastage, with everything from pens to phones and so on getting irresponsibly dumped, that then ends up causing pollution. I accept that there is an additional issue with the lithium batteries in vapes and how we deal with that.

Although I do not claim to be an expert in vaping, I argue it is a positive thing to move people away from smoking tobacco and over to vaping. The organisations the hon. Lady mentioned, such as ASH, the British Heart Foundation and Asthma + Lung UK, have all said that it is 95% risk free. That has to be a good thing. Moving people away from tobacco and giving them the option of vaping is a really positive thing that the Government could embrace more than it has previously. We are not bad in this country at promoting vaping, compared with many other countries where, ridiculously, it has been banned. I was slightly concerned by the comment, which the hon. Lady made at the end of her speech, that we should perhaps get rid of some disposable vaping devices. I would wholeheartedly oppose that because, although there is an issue with the disposal of these disposable vaping devices, to put people off vaping and maybe encourage them to go back to smoking would be a retrograde step.

I remember that when I was at school there were children who opted for tobacco, and cigarettes were common when I was growing up in the 1980s. I was one of the smokers behind the bike sheds myself. Although we do not want any children under the age of 18 vaping and we do not want non-smokers vaping, there will always be a forbidden fruit, unfortunately, when it comes to children. If you could have tobacco or vaping as that forbidden fruit, which would you prefer? You would prefer to have neither and I accept that, but vaping is 95% risk free. That is far better than when I was a child in the 1980s and so many children chose to smoke.

[Kirsten Oswald]

Thinking back to the 1980s—the hon. Gentleman and I must be of a similar vintage—I absolutely recognise what he is saying but I would point him back to what I said earlier about the WHO’s concerns about vaping being a gateway to tobacco for young people. I am taking this from a briefing from ASH so, to reiterate, I absolutely support any and all means of supporting people to stop smoking, but it cannot be that it is only one or the other thing with all the personal and environmental issues that this causes.

[Gareth Johnson]

I take her point. I do not have the statistics in front of me, but what I have seen suggests that there is not a great deal of evidence that people go from vaping on to smoking, whereas there is substantial evidence that people go from smoking on to vaping. Vaping is a far more successful way of giving up smoking that the likes of patches and chewing gum. Therefore, from a health perspective, the Government should be encouraging and promoting smokers to move on to vaping because there is far less risk associated with it.

I will draw my comments to a conclusion there. I was not intending to speak at all, but what I do not want to come out of this debate is some kind of demonisation of vaping. I know that is not the hon. Lady’s intention, but I feel that we should be recognising that vaping has its place—a very valuable place—in ensuring that we reduce the number of people dying around the world from tobacco consumption, which we all know is ridiculously dangerous for your health. Vaping has a substantially reduced risk for individuals and therefore we should embrace it. Although there certainly are improvements to be made and I am grateful that the hon. Lady has highlighted those, we should see vaping as a positive thing to help people give up smoking tobacco.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kirsten Oswald and Gareth Johnson

Tuesday 18th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Gareth Johnson]

Access to legal advice is, of course, extremely important to anyone seeking asylum, which is why legal assistance is available to all asylum claimants. For example, 30 minutes of telephone legal advice and access to legal aid are available to people who claim asylum in this country.

[Kirsten Oswald]

Does the Minister agree with the chief executive of the group Refugee Action that stepping back from the UK’s obligations under the 1951 convention would be

“a blatant breach of the international refugee laws that the UK proudly helped create in the first place”,

and does the new Justice Secretary not feel a responsibility to uphold those international obligations?

[Gareth Johnson]

Everything we are doing complies with the UN convention, and with the UN convention on human rights. It also complies with national law. I have to say to Scottish National party Members that if they spent a little more time looking at the border between the UK and France and a little less time looking at the border between England and Scotland, they might come up with some viable alternatives.