Sean Barrett (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister. We always have great debates when he comes to this House. There may be some useful points on minimum pricing. I accept what Senators Norris and Crown have said. Minimum pricing enriches the people doing the minimum pricing. I understand the Minister for Finance, the Minister of State with responsibility for public service reform and the OPW and the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform would be delighted to have more tax revenue. I agree with the Senators who said it is a very strange imposition of competition policy to have competition in products that, as the Minister so eloquently put it, damage people. It might be important, because there are also voices saying that the Minister should think of minimum pricing for alcohol, and some of them are in the alcohol industry. Some producers like minimum pricing. That we can drive down prices and give them less, even in this heinous industry, is the grain of consolation I see in the court decision. In response to Senator Crown, action on smoking in cars should have been much quicker. Senator Crown proposed that measure to protect children in cars going on holidays with their parents last summer and I do not know the reason for the delay.

The Minister should examine duty-free return of tobacco. As our very helpful research services show, we quite rightly have an extremely high price for cigarette products and people bring them back by the cartload through Dublin Airport and other airports. This is damaging, and must undo much of the work the Minister is trying so valiantly to do. I do not know whether it contradicts our European obligations, but this should be considered in terms of dealing with it as a health issue, and we should aim to bring the price of tobacco products people bring back into this country up to the Irish retail price. As other speakers have said, we sometimes get fairly strange decisions from Europe. One speaker mentioned the gender equality ruling that will result in women, who are safer drivers, being charged more for car insurance on the grounds that it makes them equal with dangerous male drivers. That is a very strange definition of equality. The design faults in the euro itself have cost this country billions, so we must examine what comes from Europe rather than always touching the forelock.

We need research on the reasons people take up smoking. We have run the smoking information campaigns but we need to get into the psychology of young people who take up smoking as a way of appearing to be mature. Will the Minister consider interviewing people whose smoking has brought therm to the point of exit from this world? Let the real story be told. Let us interview people who will no longer be alive in a few months time because of smoking. I recall being in Howth with a dear friend, who was a heavy smoker. He could walk down the hill of Howth but it took ages to walk back up it. Let us put the truth about this dreadful product before young people.

The measures against smuggling are absolutely essential. I see, and I am sure the Minister does see, these products on sale widely. I wonder if some of the victims would take court cases against the tobacco companies, as they do in the United States, as this would take some of the load off the Minister's shoulders. Very successful cases have been taken in the American jurisdiction against the industry for selling narcotics branded to persuade people they will become a better cowboy or a more beautiful film star. Let us go for the reality. There are cases pending against the health service in cases in which people believe there has been malpractice, however, as the Minister said, this must be one of the greatest malpractices.

I note the Minister has raised the issue of plain packaging. Are we carrying community rating on health insurance excessively when we do not allow a discount for not smoking. I am aware the Minister is looking at the health insurance sector. I recall a very eminent colleague who actually told people that he could not go ahead with the expensive operation because the patient was smoking in the room and all the medical expense and all the expertise would be undone by a person continuing to smoke. I do not know whether he ever carried out that threat or promise. Taking such action would bring across from medicine how appalling people find smoking. I asked Professor Shane Allwright in TCD who has done a lot of work on this issue and she welcomes the Minister's anti-promotions section. Sometimes I think the European Court should think about what it is legitimising. Minimum pricing may have made the sellers' role more profitable. Let us get at them by reducing their profitability. I am sure the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, would be delighted to hear of proposal to increase taxation as he needs the revenue.