F E AT U R E
REGULATION: THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY
The IBVTA delve into the many qualities and consequences of regulation
BY LEO FORFAR
You’ll be hard-pressed to find a more fitting title for the task
of tackling regulation, the most necessary and sometimes
burdensome aspect of business. But, like a great film, this issue
has nuance and elasticity; the good comes with a catch, the bad
needs to be recognised for what it is before it can be scrapped,
and the ugly could prove improvable with some grooming.
Introduced in the opening talk but unpacked and expanded
upon in the following by Liam Humberstone of Totally Wicked
(with interjections by Conference Chairman and host Ricardo
Polosa), the function and condition of UK vape regulation was
explained follows.
THE GOOD:
• Knowing what we’re selling.
It’s a given that e-liquid mixers and distributors must never accept
less than the best, or anything unsafe.
• Improved focus on quality
• The image of greater control being exercised canenable and
improve confidence; not just that of newer businesses, but
consumer confidence as well.
THE BAD:
• Prohibition of tanks and bottles
• This one has been met with highly negative reception, covered
at length in Vapouround. It’s increasingly common for bottles to
be sold in multipacks – continuing the status quo of consumption
size with nothing changed but the addition of an extra
bureaucratic step.
• Upper limit of nicotine strength
Considered arbitrary at best, with many studies failing to find any
harm in nicotine justifying this kind of restriction.
THE UGLY:
• Prohibition of marketing and related information dissemination
This is a stunting situation; it will be difficult to debunk myths about
vaping that reduce our flexibility and slow efforts to reform. There
is misleading and ugly rhetoric attached to vapour products, such
the construct of the “nicotine addict” persists in popular media.
Liam also confirmed what many felt about UK vaping and regulation:
that the primary harm done was by heavy-handedness rather than
a light touch. While expressing disappointment that vape products
are regulated under the same canopy as the very thing they are
liberating smokers from, he said that many businesses hadn’t yet
acted with the urgency that the new regulations demand.
86 ISSUE 11 VAPOUROUND MAGAZINE