ASH policy paper for the APPG on Smoking and Health: Establishing a Smokefree Fund

Therefore, the appropriate regulatory response to the monopoly-style pricing power of the tobacco manufacturers is to control the pricing of the industry rather than open it up to competition, which should ensure that the industry cannot pass the cost of the levy on to the consumer. [...] An additional benefit of the scheme is that it would further limit tobacco companies’ ability to use price as a marketing tool to differentiate and promote products, so undermining the effectiveness of tobacco taxation, as is still the case, despite the introduction of a Minimum Excise Tax in 2017.44 6 of 20 Setting the price to underpin the levy The levy would operate through a cap on the wholesa. [...] In the UK, the obvious home for oversight of the 8 of 20 Fund would be the DHSC Office of Health Improvement and Disparities, which already oversees the Government’s tobacco control programme.46 Given the purpose of the fund is to make smoking obsolete and deliver a Smokefree future, tobacco sales would decline significantly over time and hence the revenue generated would also decline. [...] In line with our obligations under the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, and in particular Article 5.3 of the Convention, the scheme would be fully statutory, and it is not suggested there should be any form of negotiation between government and the tobacco industry of the content of the tobacco control scheme, any reviews of the scheme, or how the Smokefree Fund is spent. [...] It is negotiated every five years between the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) on behalf of the UK Government (and for the health departments of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland), and the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI), the main trade association of the research-based pharmaceutical industry in the UK.