The Modelling Review Expert Panel (which is external to the Department for International Trade (DIT)) has concluded their review. DIT is currently reviewing their recommendations and will provide an update on this review in due course.

Throughout the pandemic, economic analysis has been a key part of the advice that ministers use to inform decisions taken in this fast-moving health environment. The Treasury continues to provide economic analysis to ministers on an ongoing basis as part of policy making and design.

The Treasury does not produce formal forecasts for the UK economy. Economic and fiscal forecasting is the responsibility of the independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) who updated their forecasts on 25 November 2020.

Throughout the pandemic, economic analysis has been a key part of the advice that ministers use to inform decisions taken in this fast-moving health environment.

The Treasury continues to provide economic analysis to ministers on an ongoing basis as part of policy making and design. The Treasury does not produce formal forecasts for the UK economy. Economic and fiscal forecasting is the responsibility of the independent OBR who updated their forecasts on 25 November 2020.

Throughout the pandemic, economic analysis has been a key part of the advice that ministers use to inform decisions taken in this fast-moving health environment.

The Treasury continues to provide economic analysis to ministers on an ongoing basis as part of policy making and design. The Treasury does not produce formal forecasts for the UK economy. Economic and fiscal forecasting is the responsibility of the independent OBR. They will publish their next forecast on 25 November.

Economic analysis undertaken by the Treasury draws on a wide range of sources, including analysis from external sources such as the OBR, Bank of England and other independent bodies.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) published on its website an impact assessment (IA) on the regulation of nicotine containing products (NCPs), including electronic cigarettes, on 12 June 2013 which provided estimates of the costs associated with medicinal regulation of NCPs. A copy has been placed in the Library and is available at:

www.mhra.gov.uk/NCPs.

The IA was prepared by the MHRA and the cost of its production has not been calculated.

The IA does not estimate the cost of achieving Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP). Manufacturing in this sector is almost exclusively conducted outside the European Union and the IA makes the assumption that in the first instance, the foreign manufacturers would bear the costs of achieving GMP. The IA also makes the assumption that any production that might be established within the EU in the future would bear similar costs of achieving relevant manufacturing standards regardless of whether the unlicensed NCPs come into the scope of medicines regulations or not.

The IA makes the assumption that it is likely that manufacturers, EU marketing authorisation holders, and all other participants in the supply chain would seek to pass their incremental costs onto their buyers, and ultimately to consumers. The extent to which United Kingdom consumers would bear the incremental costs is unclear. Pricing of NCPs seems to be constrained at the upper bound by the pricing of tobacco products. The IA suggests that NCP consumers would be unlikely to suffer from substantial price increases if these products were regulated as medicines.

The intention of regulating NCPs under the medicines framework is to ensure that products which meet appropriate standards of safety, quality and efficacy are available to support reducing the harms of smoking to smokers and those around them. The value of the health gains associated with a single successful quit attempt is very substantial — the Department estimates it to be £74,000. The orders of magnitude of estimated compliance costs suggests that a policy of licensing e-cigarettes would have to create very few additional successful quit attempts for the benefits to justify its costs. It is estimated that implementing policies to reduce smoking prevalence by 1% per year for 10 years in the UK would prevent over 57,000 deaths in that period.