Mr. Chris Macey:

I will come in briefly on the previous question. I remember a time when young children would be seen going into shops to buy three Major cigarettes and a pennyworth of chewing gum for 10p. That was stopped, then the sale of a packet of ten cigarettes was stopped and we went to packs of 20. In Australia, cigarettes are sold in packets of 30. I have seen some evidence that what Deputy Burke is talking about may be a problem and may be something we have to deal with. It needs to be looked at. We might be able to look at that through the tax system. The excise on cigarettes could be amended or adjusted to take account of those larger sales that are cheaper per unit and are, therefore, making it cheaper to smoke. As Mr. Gordon said, generally speaking, the more young people have to pay for cigarettes, the more out of their reach they tend to be.

The issue of bringing amounts of tobacco in that are not smuggled but are not duty paid is one that should be looked at. There is no point having a high-tax policy if people can circumvent it in any way. We have to constantly be vigilant in rooting out loopholes to prevent that. Smuggling is the other area. Over many years, we have called for Revenue to have more resources, both manpower and physical resources, to ensure that smuggling is minimised. Up to two or three years ago, it was doing very well in getting the rate down to below the EU average but it is creeping up again. We have to make sure that there is a proper action plan to tackle, specifically, cigarette and tobacco smuggling. In addition, Revenue should be empowered with the resources it needs to tackle the problem effectively.