Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to tackle the sale of illegal vapes in (a) South Holland and the Deepings constituency and (b) Lincolnshire.

The Tobacco and Vapes Bill will strengthen enforcement and crack down on rogue retailers by enabling ministers in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland to introduce a licensing scheme for the retail sale of tobacco, vapes, and nicotine products. The bill also enables the introduction of a new registration scheme for tobacco, vape, and nicotine products sold in the United Kingdom’s market. This will help ensure products are compliant with product safety standard requirements, and enable Trading Standards to remove non-compliant products from the market quickly and efficiently.

In 2025/26 we will invest £10 million of new funding into Trading Standards, to enhance their work in tackling the illicit and underage sale of tobacco and vapes, and to support the implementation of the bill. This funding will be used to recruit approximately 80 new regionally coordinated apprentices in England. This will benefit all regions, including the East Midlands, which covers South Holland and the Deepings and Lincolnshire.

The introduction of a new Vaping Products Duty in October 2026 will provide civil and criminal powers for HM Revenue and Customs to assess for duty and seize products and equipment used to produce or transport illicit vapes.