Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is those types of messages we need to focus on, particularly for young people. Deputy Gould spoke about the smell of the product on a person's clothes and breath. There is also the impact it has on health but that seems to be secondary for many young people who start smoking. I am not convinced by the idea of censoring images of people smoking in old films and so on. On some of the chat shows from years ago, everyone was smoking. I grew up during that period, but that looks really odd to me when I see it now. I ask myself what these people were doing. It is a bit like people who used to drink and drive; it is not acceptable to society now. At one stage, we almost turned people who smoked into pariahs in that we put them outside the pub or the social areas, but there was a sort of bounce-back and people would talk about how all the craic was outside. We are going through cycles in that regard but my main worry regarding the research relates to why more people are trying it. I do not think the price increases work, although they are a good earner for the State that can be reinvested.