Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am bringing the argument to a human level.

While I do not suggest that any of the companies represented target children in this country, the bottom line is that the tobacco industry, like every other industry, needs customers. Its customers die and it needs new customers. There is no point in recruiting a customer who is 75 years of age. The tobacco industry wants to recruit them at 12, 13, 14 and 15 years because the longer a person smokes, the more addicted he or she becomes and the more tobacco products he or she will buy. We live in a commercial world and we know what the tobacco industry is about. I am not arguing that the tobacco industry aggressively targets children here but it does so elsewhere in the world.

I read some of the transcripts of the hearings in the US Congress and Senate. The tobacco industry did not do itself any favours at the hearings. For years, it denied that smoking had health implications or that the industry took an aggressive approach to making tobacco as addictive as possible in order that people would continue to smoke. The credibility of the industry has been shattered internationally. For this reason, the State has an obligation to try to protect its citizens from a deeply damaging product. That tobacco is legally promoted around the world with the permission of governments and revenue authorities should not prevent us from doing everything possible to discourage as many people as we can from starting to smoke and encouraging those who smoke to stop.

If it is the witnesses' contention that there is no evidence to support the view that plain packaging will persuade people to stop smoking and prevent young people from starting smoking, why are they concerned about the proposal? Japan Tobacco International took the Australian Government to court to prevent the implementation of plain packaging for cigarettes. It is farcical to suggest that evidence should be available to show plain packaging works within 14 months of its implementation. Tobacco is an addictive substance and I would expect the witnesses to appreciate that one would need more than 14 months to produce evidence to show whether plain packaging works or otherwise.

I hope plain packaging will be introduced here and I hope it works. In the meantime, we should do everything possible to encourage people to give up smoking. Mr. Mallon may argue that smokers take a rational decision based on free will to continue to smoke. Smokers continue to do so, by and large because they are addicted to tobacco.