Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to tackle the sale of illegal vapes on the black market.

The Government is concerned about the worrying rise in vaping among children, with youth vaping tripling in the last three years, and one-in-five children having now used a vape. Underage sales and illicit vapes are undermining the work the Government is doing to protect our children's health.

To address this, in April 2023, the Government announced a £3 million investment over two years to enhance work on illicit vape enforcement. Led by National Trading Standards, this builds on existing work by local trading standards officers across the country to ensure that vapes sold in the United Kingdom comply with The Tobacco and Related Products Regulations 2016, as well as other relevant legislation that applies to vaping products. Activities include data collection and analysis to understand the scale of illegal products and sales, and market surveillance work. Through this work, they identified that 2.1 million illicit vapes were seized across England by trading standards from 2022 to 2023.

To strengthen our enforcement activity, the Government will also provide an additional £30 million of funding per year for enforcement agencies, including trading standards. This increase in investment will help to stamp out criminal activity by boosting the enforcement of illicit tobacco and vapes.