Monday 21 September 2015

E-cigarettes and the EU: a user's guide

From May next year, the e-cigarette industry will have to abide by new EU laws that were agreed behind closed doors under the Tobacco Products Directive. If you use second or third generation e-cigarette - as most vapers in the UK do - these laws will have a major (negative) impact on you.

I've written a short briefing paper for the Epicenter Network (a group of European think tanks) explaining what the EU laws say and what it will mean for vapers and the e-cigarette industry. It's not pretty and national governments have limited ability to implement it sensibly. They do, however, have some latitude so you should encourage lawmakers to use common sense and - above all - not to gold-plate it with yet more meddlesome legislation.

If you're reading this, you probably have an above-average interest in these matters but I would guess that nine out of ten vapers have no idea that the quality of products is about to be radically degraded from next year so please read the briefing paper and share it widely.

I've had a few comments by e-mail about other issues with the EU legislation. If you have others, please leave them below and I'll blog about this again tomorrow.

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