In a vape shop in Bramley town centre, the popular flavours can sell out quickly. The area is a smoking and vaping hotspot – high above the national average – and it is also in chancellor Rachel Reeves’s constituency of Leeds West and Pudsey. “Have you got any blueberry, love?” one customer asked, telling the Guardian that she had been smoking since the age of 11 and was much happier vaping instead.
She was not pleased to hear the price of vapes would be going up 2% above the retail prices index, but concluded: “It’s still cheaper than cigs.” The cashier said the shop was especially busy with older people who had quit smoking due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease COPD. As well as having high rates of the lung condition, Bramley has above average levels of heart disease, obesity and mental health problems.
An old industrial part of Leeds previously dominated by mills and factories, the ward is one of the more deprived in the city and in desperate need of Reeves’s promise to “invest, invest, invest”. Outside Greggs was Steve Cook, who is retired but works part time driving the “Happy Cab” for the charity Bramley Elderly Action, ferrying older people around for days out and shopping trips. “They go in happy and come home ecstatic,” he said.
Having previously loved Reeves, who got 49% of the vote in this historically Labour area, Cook said it had been “knives out” among his friends when the winter fuel payment was cut. “We said we’re n.
