No Smoking Day 2024
Tuesday 12 MarchNo Smoking Day is one of the UK’s biggest health awareness campaigns, it provides a supportive environment for people to quit smoking. It also highlights the many sources of help and advice available to smokers who want to give up the habit. West Yorkshire Trading Standards is encouraging smokers to take the first step in giving up smoking for good, by making a pledge on No Smoking Day which takes place on Wednesday 13th March.
Stopping smoking for 28 days means you are five times more likely to stop for good. Last year thousands of people successfully quit smoking with help and support. Smoking tobacco is harmful to your health and the health of others around you, not to mention the environment and your bank balance. None of these facts are disputed, however many do still find themselves smoking as they haven't been motivated enough or felt that they had the right level of will-power to quit.
The Tackling Illicit Tobacco for Better Health Programme, funded by the five Public Health departments, is helping people to stop tobacco use for good by educating communities and by investigating traders who supply cheap and illicit tobacco. The initiative uses multi-agency enforcement and community marketing campaigns to tackle the problems of the illicit trade.
Illegal Tobacco is often less than half the tax-paid price of legally sold tobacco, this maintains smokers in their habit and encourages young people to start smoking. Illegal Tobacco trading creates a cheap source for children and young people to start smoking, severely impacting genuine businesses by undercutting them. It is also linked to organised crime, contributing to an underground economy worth billions of pounds. Victims of human trafficking are often being forced to sell these illegal products in order to pay off debts they may have, or even fearing harm to themselves or their families.
To date the programme has taken more than 12 million illicit cigarettes, and more than 3.5 tonnes of illicit hand rolling tobacco off the streets of West Yorkshire. With more inspections planned in the coming weeks, these figures are set to increase. Training sessions with thousands of members of the public and hundreds of front line professionals have been delivered to raise awareness about the dangers and wider criminality associated with the supply of illicit tobacco.
Linda Davis, Trading Standards Manager, said “Members of the public should recognise the adverse health, economic and social impacts of the illicit trade of tobacco products, including the linkages with human trafficking and a wide range of organised crimes. Far from being a victimless crime, the illegal trade in tobacco costs government millions each year in lost revenue, makes it easier for children to start smoking, takes advantage of cash-strapped families, and helps fund organised crime.”
Councillor Melanie Jones, Chair of the West Yorkshire Joint Services Committee which oversees the work of Trading Standards, said “The illegal sale of tobacco in communities enables and encourages young children to buy it cheaply. I would like to thank members of the public for reporting illegal sales and encourage everyone to continue doing so to reduce the harm caused by tobacco in our communities. To anyone who is a smoker, it’s never too late to make positive changes.”
If you need to report a trader selling cheap and illicit tobacco please contact the Citizens Advice consumer helpline: 0808 223 1133 anonymously.
Anyone wanting help to quit can find their local Stop Smoking Service at