Section 4(1) of the Tobacco and Primary Medical Services (Scotland) Act 2010 (“the Act”) provides that it is an offence to sell a tobacco product or cigarette papers to a person under the age of 18.
Section 4(2) to (4) of the Act provides a defence to such a charge. The defence is that the accused believed the customer to be 18 or over and had been shown a document bearing to be a passport, EU photocard driving licence or other prescribed document and that the document shown would have convinced a reasonable person as to the customer’s age.
Regulation 2 of these Regulations prescribes additional forms of acceptable identification.
These are—
a Defence Identity Card issued by the Ministry of Defence;
a photographic identity card bearing the national Proof of Age Standards Scheme hologram;
a national identity card issued by an EU state (other than the UK), Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein or Switzerland; and
a Biometric Immigration Document.
Regulation 3 revokes the Sale of Tobacco (Prescribed Document) Regulations 2010 which prescribed only (b) above as an additional form of acceptable identification.