Is the 'Lets-ban it' generation regulating away personal responsibility and choice?

The sale of high-caffeine energy drinks to under-16s is to be banned in England from April 2027. Disposable vapes have already been entirely banned and then there is the Government's plan for a smoke-free generation. When did banning things become Plan A for solving every problem?

The Government should be preventing harm, enforcing standards and tackling illegal behaviour, not replacing the role of parents or regulating every choice we make as individuals. We should all worry about creating a culture where parents are viewed as bystanders and government becomes the default decision-maker for every aspect of our lives.

The answer to every parenting challenge is not to remove choices from everyone and the challenge for policymakers is not to eliminate every risk from life; it is to manage risk intelligently. The question we should be asking is not “what can we ban next?” but “what problem are we actually trying to solve, and is this the best way to solve it?”

For example, it has now become politically and culturally easy to portray all vaping as a problem, which is completely contradictory. The Government’s own “swap to stop” programme promotes vaping as an effective tool to quit smoking. And Vapers now outnumber smokers in the UK, but rather than celebrating this as the public health victory it is, vaping has become a target.

The issue with bans is that they don’t address the underlying issues. There is a fundamental difference between a legitimate vape shop operating within the law, often working alongside local authorities and public health initiatives to support stop smoking services, and dodgy shop owners who sell anything to anybody. Yet vapes are increasingly portrayed as a social problem because of concerns about youth access, and the solution has too often been to take the product out of the hands of millions of adults who use them - as was the case with disposable vapes.

Good regulation should be about more than responding to headlines. It should be proportionate, evidence-based and targeted at reducing harm.

The energy drinks and vaping situation reflects a wider shift in how we approach public health. When faced with a complex issue, the first response is too often to ban something or strip away everything that makes the product appealing.

The current proposals around vapes, for example, risk taking us back to the Henry Ford approach to consumer choice: you can have any colour you like, as long as it’s black! Standardising every vape, pack, and accessory by shape, colour, and design would replace informed choice with enforced uniformity.

Are bans really the best way to support parents and young people or indeed, in the case of vapes, smokers who want to quit? It seems like a cop-out for regulators to target the product rather than the problem. We are increasingly seeing market-defining rules being made without sufficient consideration of the real impact on consumers, responsible businesses and ultimately public health.

In trying to eliminate every potential harm, we overlook the importance of informed consumer choice. Adults make decisions every day about alcohol, caffeine, fast food and countless other products that involve balancing risks and benefits. Public health is strongest when people have accurate information to make better decisions, not when others make choices for them.

____________________

Dr Marina Murphy is Senior Director of Scientific Affairs at Haypp and Scientific Adviser to the UKVIA.

LBC Opinion provides a platform for diverse opinions on current affairs and matters of public interest.

The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official LBC position.

To contact us email opinion@lbc.co.uk