Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of making the inclusion of advice on (a) how to quit smoking and (b) different methods of quitting smoking mandatory for all tobacco and nicotine-containing products.

The Department provides a range of advice and support to help people quit smoking through campaigns such as Stoptober and information on the Better Health website, alongside our funding to local stop smoking services.

To help even more smokers quit, on 14 August 2023 the Department launched a public consultation across the United Kingdom on mandating quit information messages inside tobacco packs.

The accompanying draft impact assessment states that introducing pack inserts into all tobacco products in the UK could lead to an additional 30,000 smokers giving up their habit, delivering health benefits worth £1.6 billion.

The consultation and draft impact assessment are available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/mandating-quit-information-messages-inside-tobacco-packs/mandating-quit-information-messages-inside-tobacco-packs-consultation