Are you sitting comfortably? Holding on to your hats and making sure your socks don’t get completely knocked off? Well you certainly should be, as this week the unthinkable has happened – the government has announced not one but two new policies around smoking that everyone in the industry and anti-smoking groups are all in favour of.

It seems far-fetched, I know, but there you have it – the government wants to make it illegal for under-18s to buy electronic cigarettes and at the same time make it a criminal offence for adults to buy conventional tobacco products on behalf of children – so called proxy purchasing.

In the case of the former it makes total sense: the idea of kids turning up for maths lessons with an e-cig hanging out of their mouths is seriously unpalatable – no matter how much safer e-cigs are than regular cigarettes.

Happily, responsible suppliers of electronic cigs seem to agree and have been falling over themselves to support the government’s move and make it clear they have never targeted their products at children.

“We are extremely pleased by the government’s decision to ban the sale of electronic cigarettes to children under the age of 18,” says 10motives company director Tony Jones. “As a manufacturer and distributer of e-cigarettes we have always made it clear on our products and website that we don’t sell to anyone under the age of 18.”

The criminalisation of proxy purchasing is also interesting – for many this week’s announcement will only have been surprising in the fact that this activity was not already illegal. In fact while the Licensing Act 2003 made it illegal to buy alcohol on behalf of children, no such measure was brought in for tobacco despite consistent calls from organisations such as the Association of Convenience Stores for such a move for more than a decade.

Interestingly the government this week talked about its pride in reducing the amount of red tape and legislation impacting business; but in terms of age-restricted sales the picture is still a hugely confusing one for retailers.

Whether it is booze, fags, fireworks, knives, solvents, energy drinks or lads’ mags, retailers have a vast range of product types that are subject to both statutory or voluntary age restrictions. For those enshrined in legislation, the requirements and indeed potential sanctions for retailers all vary considerably, causing serious headaches.

Proxy purchasing of tobacco will be outlawed via the Children and Families Bill along with the introduction of the new age limit for e-cigs, but perhaps retailers would benefit more from another piece of legislation bringing together all of these products and providing some much needed clarity and consistency.

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