Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask His Majesty's Government, in the light of the report by KPMG Illicit cigarette consumption in Europe, published on 11 June, what steps they are taking towards countering illicit cigarette consumption and the rise of counterfeit and non-duty-paid goods entering the UK market.

The Government has dedicated significant resource to tackling illicit tobacco and has set out its approach to doing so in successive strategies dating back to 2000. These strategies have been highly effective in reducing the estimated duty gap for cigarettes from 16.9% in 2005 to 10.5% in 2023/24 and for hand-rolling tobacco from 65.2% to 22.9% over the same period.

HMRC publishes annual data on seizures, criminal investigations and civil penalties related to tobacco. Between April 2023 and March 2024, HMRC and Border Force seized 1.36bn cigarettes and 92,435kg of hand-rolling tobacco.

In January 2024, HMRC and Border Force published the latest illicit tobacco strategy, ‘Stubbing Out the Problem’, setting out a continued commitment to reduce the trade in illicit tobacco with a focus on reducing demand, and to tackle and disrupt the organised crime groups behind the illicit tobacco trade. ^[1] The strategy was supported by £100 million of new smokefree funding over 5 years to boost existing HMRC and Border Force enforcement capability.

[1] Stubbing out the problem: A new strategy to tackle illicit tobacco - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)