Prime Minister Andy Burnham has set out plans to crack down on vape shops and betting shops on Britain's high streets, part of a wider drive to revive what he describes as hollowed out town centres. Burnham says he wants to make clear what a high street should actually look like, arguing that too many premises do little to serve their local communities. The proposals would even reach into the appearance of shopfronts, with the prime minister signalling restrictions on features such as neon signs and certain logos displayed in shop windows.
At the heart of the announcement is a change to the way vape shops are treated in the planning system. Under the plans, vape shops would be given their own dedicated category in planning law, meaning that anyone wanting to open a new one would first have to apply for planning permission from the local council. That marks a shift from the current position, in which such outlets can open more freely, and it is designed to give communities a say over how many appear on their high streets.
For betting shops, Burnham intends to scrap a rule that came in under the Gambling Act of 2005. The measure, a Tony Blair-era policy, effectively made it more difficult for local councils to stop betting shops from opening in their areas. By removing that rule, the government wants to hand town halls greater power to refuse new bookmakers where they judge there are already too many, addressing a long-standing complaint from local authorities that their hands have been tied.
The push builds on ground that had already been touched by his predecessor. Keir Starmer's government had also spoken about the need to crack down on vape shops, but Burnham is trying to go further and to move more quickly. Since arriving in Number 10 he has sought to hit the ground running across a range of policies, presenting himself as a leader determined to make a tangible and visible difference to people's everyday lives rather than simply talking about change.
There is also a clear electoral calculation behind the plan. Research from the think tank Power to Change suggests that in places blighted by derelict and run-down high streets, voters are more likely to shift their allegiance away from Labour. The state of local high streets is something people genuinely care about, and the sense that town centres have been hollowed out has become a politically potent issue that the party is keen to be seen tackling head on.
The announcement comes as Labour's fortunes have picked up since Burnham took over as prime minister. A new Sky News and YouGov poll shows the party with the highest voting intention it has recorded since July 2025, while support for Reform slipped to its lowest level since the 2024 general election. Commentators have described the shift as a Burnham bounce, the kind of lift often seen when a new leader enters Downing Street, and it is a trend the prime minister will be keen to sustain.
The measures have not been universally welcomed. The Liberal Democrats argued that the plans are not ambitious enough and that the government needs to go even further to protect struggling high streets. From the other direction, Reform and the Conservatives warned that the crackdown could backfire, cautioning that tighter restrictions might simply leave more units standing empty and add to the number of vacant shops on Britain's high streets rather than reviving them.