Sandra McLellan (Cork East, Sinn Fein)

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this technical Bill which allows the Minister to introduce combined text and photographic health warning on tobacco products. We have no difficulty with these amendments to the Public Health (Tobacco) Act 2002. The Bill provides an opportunity to address some of the issues around smoking. Progress has been made in recent years especially through the smoking ban. Studies have already shown the benefit of this ban both for workers in the indoor areas where it operates and for the general public. However, smoking is all too prevalent. Young people continue to take up smoking in large numbers. A study by Dr. Alan Moran in Drogheda looked at the issues of peer-parent-sibling pressure on smoking and the reasons teenagers stop smoking. He surveyed pupils from three main secondary schools in the north east and found that if a sibling smoked, the adolescent was three and a half times more likely to smoke. If a best friend smoked, they were 11.5 times more likely to smoke. Of the boys surveyed, 79% reported enjoying smoking, 80% reported having tried to stop smoking and 70% wanted to stop. The reasons they started smoking were stress, 34%; to feel cool, 15%; to feel confident, 11%; enjoyment, 10%; addiction, 9%; and because friends smoked, 3.3%. Only 9% thought they smoked because they were addicted but 34% because they were stressed. Also of interest in this study is that, in spite of legislation banning the sale of cigarettes to those under 16 years, all the adolescent smokers stated they were able to buy cigarettes when asked where they got them from.

Many older people who have smoked are experiencing all the hugely damaging health consequences. The cost in terms of population health and the drain on the scarce resources of our public health services is very substantial. The campaign to reduce smoking and to work towards a smoke-free society is very important and needs to be maintained and expanded.

Action on Smoking on Health, ASH Ireland, has expressed disappointment that Ministers for Finance did not increase the price of tobacco sufficiently in their budgets. The organisation has pointed out that price is recognised by the World Health Organisation and others as the most important way of encouraging smokers to quit and discouraging young people from experimenting with tobacco. The Government response is to express the view that such price increases might encourage tobacco smuggling. That is not an adequate response.

Tobacco smuggling is a huge problem and needs to be tackled in its own right. It is huge business for criminal empires internationally with a big market in Ireland. The cigarettes being illegally imported in billions are very often even more dangerous and more toxic than those legally imported and sold here. Anyone involved at any level in this deplorable trade, whether criminal bosses or people selling cigarettes from their homes to children, is to be condemned and should be made accountable to the law. We should continue to co-operate to make progress in reducing smoking in our society. Sinn Féin supports the Bill.

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