LAW CHANGE
From 29 October 2026, vaping and nicotine products covered by the new rules can only be sold to people aged 18 or over. New rules will also cover adults buying for under-18s, promotions and vending machines.
LAW CHANGE: NOW IN FORCE
A new UK tax and stamp system for vape liquids started on 1 October 2026. The stamp is about tax and supply rules — it is not a health or safety mark.
SAFETY ALERT
Welsh drug testing has found unexpected synthetic cannabinoids, sometimes known as Spice, in some vapes sold or described as THC, CBD or cannabinoid products.
New 2025 SHRN data shows regular vaping and smoking have fallen among secondary school learners in Wales. We look at the latest figures, what they mean and why prevention work still matters.
What does peer pressure look like? Sometimes it is obvious. Sometimes it looks more like a joke, a …
A year ago, disposable vapes had become hard to miss. They were in shop displays, coat pockets, school …
LAW CHANGE
From 29 October 2026, vaping and nicotine products covered by the new rules can only be sold to people aged 18 or over. New rules will also cover adults buying for under-18s, promotions and vending machines.
LAW CHANGE: NOW IN FORCE
A new UK tax and stamp system for vape liquids started on 1 October 2026. The stamp is about tax and supply rules — it is not a health or safety mark.
SAFETY ALERT
Welsh drug testing has found unexpected synthetic cannabinoids, sometimes known as Spice, in some vapes sold or described as THC, CBD or cannabinoid products.
New 2025 SHRN data shows regular vaping and smoking have fallen among secondary school learners in Wales. We look at the latest figures, what they mean and why prevention work still matters.
Continue reading
What does peer pressure look like? Sometimes it is obvious. Sometimes it looks more like a joke, a trend, bright packaging, something that keeps appearing online, boredom, curiosity, stress or somebody saying, “Go on, just try it.”
ASH Wales has launched Nicofiends, a new free bilingual campaign helping children and young people recognise the pressures, feelings, messages and tricks that can pull them into smoking, vaping or nicotine use.
Nicofiends turns those influences into memorable monster characters that young people can spot, question and talk about. And there is much more to Nicofiends than meeting the monsters.
The new Nicofiends resource hub has been built for people working with young people aged 4 to 18 across Wales.
Teachers can pick up a ready-to-run school pack. Youth workers can choose a quick game for a 15-minute session. Sports coaches can get a team moving. Families can go straight to the competition. Groups looking for something playful can try the new Nicofiends card game. Everything is free, with resources available in English and Welsh.
Schools can choose resources suited to the age of their pupils.
The school resources come with the guidance and materials needed to run the activities, rather than leaving staff to build a lesson from scratch. The KS2 lesson, for example, is structured around recognising pressure from people, feelings, packaging and online messages, understanding nicotine and giving pupils ways to pause, think and make their own choices.
The Nicofiends Quick Activities bank lets youth workers, teachers and community staff choose an activity by age, time available and type of activity.
Each activity gives the adult running it practical guidance: what it explores, what is needed, how to run it, questions to ask afterwards and how it connects back to smoking, vaping or nicotine.
Many include Make it Easier and Make it Harder options, helping leaders adapt an activity for the young people in front of them. Safety notes and printable materials are there where they are needed too.
So a youth worker with ten minutes can pick Pressure Postcards or Hold the Line. A group with more time might try Hype Lab, Mystery Auction, What’s Missing? or Create Your Nicofiend.
Nicofiends is heading into sport too. ASH Wales has worked with WRU Community Rugby on a dedicated Pressure Off: Games for Sports Clubs pack.
Instead of sitting young people down for a lesson, the pack uses active team games to explore peer pressure, confidence, decision-making and backing your teammates.
The activities can fit into a training night or club session and can be adapted for different ages, abilities and sports settings.
The pack gives coaches clear instructions, short team huddles, easier and harder versions and practical support information. Coaches do not need to be nicotine experts – the focus is on creating a useful conversation through play.
There is a new way to meet the characters too. The Nicofiends Card Game is a fast, discussion-friendly game for 2–5 players aged 11–16. Players come up against Nicofiends representing different pressures and use NicoFriends – choices and strategies that can help to battle them.
The cards bring together peer pressure, feelings, marketing, hype and nicotine tricks in a format young people can actually play with, rather than another worksheet.
The launch comes with a Wales-wide creative competition. Children and young people can invent an original Nicofiend based on a pressure, feeling, message or trick linked to smoking, vaping or nicotine.
They can draw, paint, collage, craft or create their idea digitally. They do not need a special entry sheet – an idea created on ordinary paper can be entered too. Twelve winning ideas will be professionally reimagined as official Nicofiends playing cards and animated campaign characters for 2027.
Winners will receive a Nicofiends card game, prize bundle, certificate and voucher. Entries close 4th December 2026.
Nicofiends was built so adults working with young people can use as much or as little as they need. Run a school session. Pick one ten-minute activity. Download the youth pack. Take a team game onto the pitch. Play the card game. Create a Nicofiend.
Explore all the free Nicofiends resources at ash.wales/nicofiends
And once you have tried them, we want to hear what your young people thought. Feedback from schools, clubs, groups and young people will help shape where Nicofiends goes next.
Nicofiends is supported by funding from The National Lottery Community Fund’s Awards for All programme and the Simon Gibson Charitable Trust.
A year ago, disposable vapes had become hard to miss. They were in shop displays, coat pockets, school toilets, parks, buses, bins and beaches. Cheap to buy, easy to hide and often discarded after short-term use, they had become one of the most visible symbols of youth vaping and throwaway nicotine culture.
On 1st June 2025, the sale and supply of single use vapes was banned across the UK. The aim was to reduce disposable vape litter and battery waste and help reduce youth vaping.
One year on, single-use vapes remain illegal to supply or sell in Wales. The product market continues to change, while community reports still raise concerns about suspected illegal products, underage sales and other forms of non-compliance.
That is an encouraging shift in the legal market. But it does not tell the full story of what communities, families and frontline services are now seeing across Wales.
In Wales, reports to No Ifs. No Butts., the anonymous reporting route run by ASH Wales for illegal tobacco, illegal vapes, online sellers and underage sales, have risen sharply. In May 2025, immediately before the disposable vape ban came into force, No Ifs. No Butts. received 15 reports. In May 2026, reports reached 150. That is ten times higher than the same month last year, the highest monthly total recorded since No Ifs. No Butts. began, and equal to almost one report every five hours.
The disposable vape ban removed one product from legal sale, but it did not remove the demand, the marketing tactics or the business model behind it.
In the months since the ban, the market has moved quickly. Many single-use vapes have been replaced by rechargeable, high-puff and disposable-style products that can look and feel very similar to the products they replaced. Some may meet the technical rules, but they are often still cheap, brightly packaged and sold in ways that encourage short-term use.
For communities, this creates a real grey area. A product may no longer be legally classed as single use, yet still be treated like a throwaway vape. For parents and carers, the difference can be hard to spot. For schools and youth workers, the products young people are using can change quickly. For Trading Standards teams, enforcement is no longer as simple as checking whether a disposable vape is on the shelf.
This is the concern one year on: the ban has changed the legal market, but parts of the industry have found ways to keep disposable-style products in circulation. The product label may have changed. The low-cost, throwaway culture around vaping has not disappeared.
The environmental case for the disposable vape ban was always strong. Disposable vapes contain lithium batteries and electrical components that should never end up in household bins, streets, waterways or general waste.
Research by Material Focus has found that the number of vapes and pods being thrown away has fallen since the ban. But more than 6 million vapes and pods are still being discarded every week.
The Local Government Association has warned that the market has shifted to rechargeable products that are designed, sold, priced and used much like the disposables they replaced. Councils have raised concerns about vape waste, contaminated recycling and fires linked to lithium batteries in bins, bin lorries and waste sites.
For communities, the question is no longer simply whether disposable vapes are still being sold. It is whether throwaway vape culture has really changed enough.
No Ifs. No Butts. gives people a simple way to report concerns without needing proof. A report might include a shop name, postcode, online account, product, price, delivery area or concern about young people.
The latest data shows that reports are not focused on one issue alone. People are raising concerns about illegal vapes, cheap tobacco, hidden stock, online sellers, local delivery and products being sold to young people.
More than one in three reports received in May raised concerns about underage sales or young people being linked to illegal tobacco or vape sales.
Online selling is becoming a much bigger part of the picture. Reports about online sellers are already 175% higher than the whole of last year, reaching almost three times last year’s total before the year is halfway through.
Hidden stock is another recurring concern. Around one in five reports this year mention products being hidden or kept out of sight.
Illegal tobacco remains deeply linked to the issue too. Around two thirds of reports this year mention illegal tobacco, and around one in four reports mention both illegal tobacco and illegal vapes.
Together, these figures point to a market that is becoming harder for the public to understand and harder for services to track. Some concerns still relate to shops. Others point to social media, group chats, delivery routes, local networks or products kept away from public view.
One report may seem small, but it can help show a pattern.
Suzanne Cass, Chief Executive of ASH Wales, said:
“The increase in reports tells us that people are concerned about what is happening in their communities and want action.
“Last year we were receiving around one report every two days. This year we are receiving around one report every five hours. That is a significant increase and reflects both growing awareness of the reporting system and growing concern about illegal tobacco and vaping products.
“The disposable vape ban was an important step, and it is positive to see survey data suggesting fewer people are now mainly using disposable vapes. But that does not mean the wider problem has disappeared.
“The market has changed very quickly. Products that were once single use have been replaced by larger rechargeable devices, high puff products and disposable style alternatives, often sold at similar prices and still treated like throwaway products.
“The products have changed, but the problem has not gone away.”
The concerns coming through No Ifs. No Butts. match what many professionals across Wales are describing.
ASH Wales recently surveyed 80 enforcement officers, youth workers, police officers, public health professionals and community safety practitioners to understand what they are seeing locally.
Almost two thirds said the situation relating to illegal tobacco and vaping products had worsened over the last 12 months.
Young people’s safety and wellbeing came through as a major concern. Professionals raised issues linked to youth access, organised criminality, drugs, child exploitation and enforcement capacity.
Their feedback paints a picture of a fast changing market that reaches beyond one banned product. A young person may access a vape through a shop, a friend, an older pupil, an online seller, a group chat or a local contact. A product may be technically reusable, but still used like a disposable. A seller may move from open display to hidden stock, doorstep delivery or private messages.
That creates a challenge for everyone working to protect young people, reduce harm and support safer communities.
The Tobacco and Vapes Act creates new opportunities to regulate how tobacco and vaping products are promoted, presented and sold. It gives government a chance to deal with some of the features that have made vapes so appealing to young people, including colours, flavours, packaging and display.
But new powers need proper support behind them.
Laws can set the direction, but they rely on communication, enforcement and local intelligence to work in practice. Trading Standards teams need the capacity to act. Public health teams need clear messages that do not create panic or confusion. Schools, youth services and community partners need practical information. Communities need to know what they can report and how to do it safely.
Suzanne Cass added:
“The Tobacco and Vapes Act will provide new powers to regulate tobacco and vaping products, including how they are promoted, presented and sold. But a law is only as good as the enforcement and communication behind it.
“As we move into the next phase of regulation, we need enforcement services and public awareness campaigns to be properly resourced.
“Communities are telling us there is a problem. We need to make it easy for people to report concerns, make sure intelligence reaches enforcement agencies quickly, and give those agencies the resources they need to act.”
ASH Wales is calling for sustained investment to support community reporting, prevention and enforcement activity across Wales.
That includes long term funding for Trading Standards teams, clearer public communication on disposable style and high puff products, stronger action on products that continue throwaway vape habits, and better promotion of trusted anonymous reporting routes.
If you have seen illegal tobacco, illegal vapes, products being sold to young people, online sellers or hidden stock, you can report it anonymously. A shop name, postcode, online account, product, price or repeated local concern can still help build the local picture.
Report anonymously at: noifs-nobutts.co.uk/report