Mr. Chris Macey:

Deputy, when the Department appeared before the committee on this issue of flavours, it indicated that no conclusion had been arrived at. We found, working with the Irish Cancer Society, there has been great political support but it is clear that officials do not share that. How long does it have to make a decision on this? We are talking about an addiction, and an industry that is trying to take hold of a generation of children. We do not have time to make a leisurely decision on it. Even from a precautionary principle perspective we need to do something about that. It is not acceptable just to see how the situation develops because it will be too late. Imagine if tobacco smoking was invented today, and we said we will wait for 30 or 40 years to see what happens before we decide what we do about it. Knowing what we know, it would be stopped outright and there would be no issue about it. It will be terrible if we are in a position in five or ten years' time where we are saying "God, I wish we did something about that when we had the chance".