'Tobacco Illicit Trade Protocol – licensing of equipment and the supply chain'

This wordy title masks the announcement yesterday of an HMRC consultation into the tobacco supply chain and particularly for our sector, whether tobacco wholesalers and retailers should become licensed going forward.  The consultation runs to 20 May 2016.

The preamble to the consultation states that ‘the Government is keen to ensure that any response to the illicit tobacco trade is proportionate and does not add an undue administrative burden on business. It will therefore be seeking views from a wide range of stakeholders to establish clear evidence-based rationale for its decisions.  No decisions have yet been made in relation to whether parties in a supply chain should be licensed or whether some but not all parties should be licensed’.

The document goes onto to state that retailers do not currently need a licence to sell tobacco products in any part of the UK. However Scotland has implemented a registration system that requires retailers to register to sell tobacco in Scotland. A similar system is currently being introduced in Northern Ireland following a formal consultation on draft Regulations, and is being considered in Wales, where draft legislation has been published. Any case for licensing retailers will need to complement or enhance these arrangements. HMRC will aim to ensure that burdens and costs on businesses are proportionate. Clearly, any prospect of licensing retailers would affect a large number of businesses in any part of the UK, and in many cases small businesses. It is important, therefore, to understand fully the impact of such a decision and to ensure any approach is proportionate in tackling illicit tobacco trade.

The consultation can be found here. 

Those who may be affected by any licensing system should be encourages to respond.