Peter Fitzpatrick (Louth, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

First of all, I am a non-smoker. I have never smoked. I do not have a clue about the taste of tobacco, but I am 100% behind Senator Crown’s proposal. I keep away from the four locations in which I see people smoking because of the danger of passive smoking. There is no point in dancing around the situation; if we do not make a decision then the practice will go on. It is important that we do so.

I know what it is like to have smokers in the house. At one stage two of my daughters smoked, but we have reduced that by 50% in that only one of them now smokes. Smoking is very dangerous. Senator Crown referred to the number of people to whom he has to give the bad news that they have cancer. Lung cancer has taken over from breast cancer to become the most common form of cancer. We will do Members a favour by banning smoking totally from the campus.