Up in smoke

We have strong concerns about the report from Stirling University highlighted in your article of 1 August (“Shops ‘enticed to promote cigarettes’ despite ban”). The report ignores the significant efforts undertaken by convenience store retailers to comply with the tobacco display ban. Equally importantly, the report ignores the impact of the plain packaging of tobacco products which has been in force in all stores across Scotland since May of this year.

The restrictions imposed by the display ban are much more severe in Scotland than in the rest of the UK. Taken together with plain packaging this means that stores simply cannot “promote” or “position” cigarettes in the way the report asserts. If customers could see behind the shutters on the gantry all they will notice now are rows and rows of drab olive-green packs with no branding and very graphic health warnings.

The strong impression we have from this report is that the authors have not visited any stores and are unaware of the most recent policy and legislative developments. Tobacco is an entirely legal product – in 2016 the UK Treasury earned £11.5 billion per year from the sale of these products – and at significant cost