Shops face cigarette ban

Shopkeepers may be banned from displaying cigarettes, if Government proposals are introduced.

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The Department of Health is launching a consultation later this spring to look at ways to stop children smoking.

In a bid to cut the number of smokers and prevent children from taking up the habit, ministers have drawn up proposals including a bar on displaying tobacco products and the removal of vending machines from pubs.

Measures that make it easier to sell nicotine replacement gums and patches are also on the table.

The proposals follow on from the introduction of the ban on smoking in public places last July. According to the Department of Health, the strategy - coupled with the wider smokefree legislation - will save hundreds of lives.

Someone who starts smoking aged 15 is three times more likely to die of cancer due to smoking than someone who starts in their late twenties, the department said.