will the price of cigarette packs finally increase in 2025?

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– The price of a pack of cigarettes could increase in 2025.

Will smoking cost more in 2025? Initially opposed to an increase in tobacco pricethe government could review its position under pressure from senators. Thursday October 17, the Minister of Budget and Public Accounts, Laurent Saint-Martinassured that the price would not increase further next year: “There is no further increase in the trajectory of tobacco growth in the financial bills presented by the government at the end of the year”. As for indexation to inflation, it should be “content”.

“Excessively large differences (in prices) with our European neighbors can lead to a weakening of flow rates, in particular those installed in border areas, and to the persistence of an excessively large parallel market”justified the minister, invited to the annual congress of the Confederation of tobacconists, reports AFP. However, on Thursday, November 21, senators adopted an amendment to the Social Security budget, currently being examined in the upper house, aimed at increasing taxes on cigarette packets (241 votes for and 2 against).

A pack of cigarettes sold at 12.70 euros on average from 2025?

The senators behind the amendment presented by Elisabeth Doineau (Union of Democrats and Independents) affirm this: in principle, the price of the package should be around 12.30 euros in 2025 and 12.60 in 2027. “With this amendment, the price of a pack of cigarettes would approach 12.70 euros from 2025, and would remain at this level in 2027”. From 2025, the price of tobacco will approach what would have been reached in 2027, not because of an increase in taxation but because of the anti-smoking plan. The latter was presented by the government in November 2023 and plans to increase the price of the package to “13 euros in 2027, with a first step at 12 euros in 2025», specifies the plan.

The measure, if adopted, should save the State 150 million euros. But it still has to pass the test of the joint committee (CMP). On Wednesday, November 27, seven deputies and seven senators met to agree on a common version of the draft social security financing bill for 2025. This is what the procedure provides for since the deputies and the senators failed to adopt a text in the same terms. The government does not participate in the CMP. If there is agreement, the text will then have to obtain the approval of two chambers. In addition to the increase in taxes on tobacco, senators also voted to increase taxes on sodas but also the indexation of pensions and the creation of a second “solidarity day”.