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Sir,

I am writing to ask you to support Lord Callanan’s fatal motion on the TPD,

I started regular smoking as a teenager in the early 90’s, I gradually increased the rate at which I smoked until I reached 2 packs a day I tried several times to quit smoking from 1999 to 2015 utilising every available option but I was unsuccessful at staying off tobacco, sometimes I managed to stay off for a few weeks but pretty much always returned to smoking within a few weeks of stopping.
In august of 2015 my wife gave me an e-cig kit with some 3mg e-liquid after seeing an advert on the TV and visiting a website, which whilst I was able to use that to reduce my smoking I was not at that point able to quit with it.

I looked around on the internet and found a forum through a banner advert in my browser which I clicked on and subsequently joined.
There I was given some good advice with respect to the amount of nicotine I required, not totally sure I needed such a high strength liquid I bought a range of strengths, 24mg, 18mg, 12mg, 9mg, 6mg, I also grabbed a few CE4 disposable tank units that were compatible with my ego battery device on advice from members of the forum.

Once they arrived the next day I put some of each liquid in a different tank with a sticky label to tell me what was what, I started at the lowest strength one and still found myself craving a cigarette just as I had been with the 3mg liquid until I reached the 24mg tank, by the ned of the day I still had half a tank and hadn’t had a cigarette since opening the post mid-morning, I went back on the website and purchased a 30ml bottle and that lasted me for a few weeks.

At this point my total spending had been about equal with a couple of days’ worth of cigarettes, as the 30ml bottle was nearing empty I went back online to order more at that time there was a postal strike on and unfortunately it didn’t arrive for several days, having been totally cigarette free for more than 3 weeks and liking the fact I could now taste things and didn’t stink of fags I decided to use the 18mg juice and hope it was enough rather than dip into the half pack of fags that was still on my desk untouched, fortunately it kept the cravings away and so I placed another order for some more lower strength e-liquid in a different flavour, and have since bought many more bottles and barely any of them were below the 30ml size, many were larger and they all come with child proof caps.

In the months since then I have bought better hardware and remained tobacco free, I have gradually reduced the nicotine levels down to 3mg, and whilst I no longer have cravings to use my e-cig like I did to start with I do enjoy vaping and have no intention of stopping at this point in time, but then again having just failed yet another quit attempt when I began vaping I had no intention of stopping smoking at that point in time either.

Now I’m sure that your wondering why I bought everything online and got all my info online, unfortunately I am one of many ex-service members who suffers from spinal problems and finds it difficult to get out and about so for me it’s a lot easier to stay at home and use the internet, had it not been so simple to get information and products online through clicking adverts in those early days of me becoming a vaper I would likely never have gotten to the point I’m at now, I tried to quit smoking after being medically discharged from the Army 4 times each time was with the aid of the local stop smoking service and each time I restarted smoking within 2 weeks as I found the stop smoking aids were either not fixing my craving or causing me blinding headaches, I never had those downsides with e-cigs and I also didn’t have the help of the professional services, however for the first time my lung function tests found a massive improvement at my last medical check-up, I no longer wheeze constantly and I feel a lot healthier despite my ailments.

My story is not remarkable for those that found their way to using e-cigs in the pre TPD era but it will be impossible to achieve for anyone in the post TPD era with limitations of 20mg/ml nicotine strength, instead of having bottles in 30ml or larger sizes that I normally buy I won’t be able to get anything larger than 10ml greatly increasing the amount of waste generated not to mention the choking hazard such small bottles represent for children and pets
For the sake of others who will find themselves in the situation I did I implore you to support the fatal motion and get rid of this wholly inappropriate legislation.

Regards