Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick, Fine Gael)

I acknowledge the presence of the Minister of State in the House and I appreciate the opportunity to speak on this matter. I come from a family where the after-effects of smoking are all too clear to see. I welcome the comments of Deputies Catherine Murphy and Mick Wallace. I watched most of their speeches in my office. However I take issue with other comments that have been made. It is not that long ago when some people believed the world was flat and that when one arrived at a certain point one fell off. Some people are of the opinion that it is all right to have one or two cigarettes. Smoking kills and that is the end of it as far as I am concerned.

Smoking causes cancer. Cigarettes contain known carcinogens which cause cancerous tumours, whether in the throat, lungs or elsewhere. We can dress it up whatever way we want but smoking kills. It is one thing to be in denial but it is another to support smokers. It would be easy to almost criminalise smokers and put them in a box and cast them out of the community. However, we must be reasonable. It is an addiction which many people find difficult to deal with. If Sir Walter Raleigh stepped off a boat from Virginia today with a new crop called "tobacco" it would be made an illegal substance and treated as such by the State and all its authorities. However, tobacco is freely available in Ireland and we must deal with it.

Deputy Wallace is correct to state it is most important to deal with young people. The fact that 80% of one class smokes is unacceptable and shows the system is failing. It also slows that society is failing. Everybody knows that for the tobacco companies to be successful their customers must be young. There is no point in getting somebody in their thirties to take up smoking; it is too late. The companies get them when they are young and keep them because the addiction is far more pronounced in people who started young. The companies get their claws into young people by investing in targeting them by making smoking look sexy and attractive and something one would want to do because one's peers do it. This has been very successful. Some of the tobacco companies are among the largest in the world.

This is also about being responsible. The legislation proposes the use of pictures and in other countries, particularly Australia and New Zealand, this is effective. Deputy Finian McGrath stated he turns off the television when he sees the car crash campaigns. This shows the campaign works because it has shocked him to a point where he turns it off. He knows what is coming next and he does not like the look of it. The Road Safety Authority has invested in encouraging people to act more responsibly. The number of lives lost on the roads has reduced because of three factors, namely, enforcement, education and engineering. Such education also needs to happen with regard to smoking.

It is a pity this is coming so late in many respects. Many people have gone to early graves because of smoking. I am not a smoker. In a sense I am lucky because I cannot be a smoker due to being asthmatic. Deputy Catherine Murphy recalled being in council chambers and at meetings of the old Eastern Health Board with Deputy Durkan where there was a fog of smoke. A person such as me would not be able to sit in such a room. Prior to the smoking ban I used to feel like choking in an atmosphere where people smoked. I had to ensure I had my inhaler in my pocket because I would not want to leave the company I was with as I would not want to be rude but I could feel myself physically choking.

Most smokers who want to quit find it difficult and I have seen this in my family. People do not want to hear lectures or told they are being criminalised. They need to be supported. Deputy Finian McGrath referred to the manner in which this can be done as being akin to the nanny state. I liked the comments made by Deputy Catherine Murphy on Irish people going abroad and seeing people smoking in airports or restaurants nudging each other and remarking how it is totally unacceptable and not politically correct. This is an element of our maturity. We in Ireland have come to accept it is not something we can take any more.

Deputy Ross stated we must be careful that we do not make the message cruel. The message is cruel and stark: smoking kills and causes cancer. The younger one starts the more likely one is to die from cancer as a result of smoking.

Last year 178 million illegal cigarettes were confiscated in Ireland. My major concern is not about the cigarettes that were confiscated but about the ones that were not. God only knows what type of filth and rubbish they contain, which people inhale into their lungs. It is the worst form of dirt that people inhale.

I support the Bill, which is a good idea. We should do anything we can to minimise the number of people who take up smoking and to encourage those who smoke to drop it. Shock value works on obesity and road safety. If it works on smoking it will be welcome. I agree with Deputy Catherine Murphy that it needs to be refreshed on an ongoing basis with the advertisements and pictures changing and campaigns being modernised.

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