Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will not support this price jump of 50 cent for a packet of cigarettes. I am probably one of the lucky people in this country who does not smoke, thankfully. I have many very close friends who smoke and I have spoken to them at length to try to see if they might give it up, and they are finding it very difficult. We need to look at educating people in some way, not punishing them. Maybe we could start at a very young age because it is at a very young age that many people start smoking. Punishing them in the pocket might be the way the Government wants to do it. I feel that that is only a tax-raising exercise. It is €56.4 million, I think the Minister said at the beginning. That is a lot of tax revenue. Of course, it is a popular tax to throw on people and the Government will not get too much criticism, but somebody has to give the other side for the smoker, and it is maybe best that I be one of those people because I do not smoke but I do understand the difficulties of people who smoke and who find it difficult to give it up. It is a comfort to them. More people - ordinary, everyday people like us - are at home and finding it difficult and an anxious time and a cigarette tends to relax them. If that is what it takes, that is what it takes. It is very easy for us just to throw on 50 cent to the price. Every time there is a budget it is 50 cent or a euro or whatever along the line, taking the price of a packet of cigarettes to €15. It is time to stop. It is an unfair move. I do not agree with any price increase whatsoever. It is time to take a step back and come at this from a different angle. Maybe an expert group should be set up to do that, rather than the Government just hanging on until the next budget, throwing another 50 cent on a packet and saying that will do the trick; it will not. As previous speakers have said, more people are turning to smoking, so this obviously has not worked. Then, of course, we may be heading towards illegal cigarettes in this country.

It is a big worry, and it is something that should be stamped out. If we keep going the road we are going, however, that industry will grow.

For the man or woman who likes a smoke, he or she will get hit one way pulling up at the filling station tomorrow morning. For the smokers who put on the heating tomorrow evening when they go to bed, they will get hit another way. If they sit down for a cigarette, they will be hit yet another way. Whatever benefits they are getting out of this budget, they are surely getting hammered left, right and centre in other ways. Obviously, some people who smoke do not have mental health issues but a large number of them do. Sometimes a cigarette is a small thing people can take to help them get through the day. This budget puts cigarettes out of some people's price range and makes life far more difficult than it should be for them. As I said, I did not support a similar measure last year and I will not support this one. Somebody needs to speak up for the ordinary people who struggle and need a packet of cigarettes a day to keep themselves ticking over in society. For people who find themselves in a lot of difficulty, smoking is sometimes a way of relaxing. I certainly will not refuse them that.

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