A leading advocate for tobacco control on Monday welcomed the government's plans to outlaw the possession and use of alternative smoking products in public, with a view of extending the ban to other premises going forward.

The items in question include e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products.

Officials also want to ban the sale of flavoured tobacco products like cigars and shisha, or smoking through water pipes.

They were among a raft of proposals unveiled last Friday under the Tobacco Control Legislation Amendment Bill.

Speaking on RTHK's Hong Kong Today programme, Judith Mackay, the Director of the Asian Consultancy on Tobacco Control, welcomed the new proposals.

"I think they're very timely... the Hong Kong government has been introducing proposals almost year by year, including tax increases and legislation and public health education."

"So this is just a continuation of what's been going on, and very necessarily going on, for a very long time," Mackay added.

She said Hong Kong had done well in raising awareness of the dangers of smoking and drastically reducing the number of smokers over the past few decades.

"We're one of a handful, a handful of jurisdictions in the world that have brought smoking down into single figures. So we've done well in that respect," said Mackay.

"But well is never enough, I'm afraid, with smoking. We've always got to do that bit more."