David Cullinane (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the Chamber. On behalf of the Sinn Féin party, I welcome the publication of this Bill and commend it to the House and to all Senators. It is, in our view, a vital protection of public health. I will refrain from taking the opportunity to discuss cancer services in the south-east, including Waterford, because I believe the Minister is going to be in Waterford city on Friday. I am glad to see he is back to full health and I look forward to seeing him both inside and outside Waterford Regional Hospital on Friday when he visits.

This is an important Bill. It is very simple: sunbeds cause cancer. It should not go any further than that when people make up their minds on whether they support this Bill. If the Bill is passed and implemented, then lives will be saved, fewer people will get cancer and less taxpayers' money will be spent treating people with cancer. Therefore, there will obviously be huge benefits to having the Bill passed.

Senator van Turnhout has already articulated areas in which some in the Opposition, including my own party, would like the Minister to go further and would support him in his efforts if that were the path he chose. While he may not take the opportunity here, I have no doubt that if this Bill is implemented in its current form we will be back here at some point in order to take it further, because it just makes sense and is logical to do so. Anything that makes sense and is logical is something we should do.

I understand that it is difficult to strike a balance between what might be seen as coercion and the use of legislation to encourage a modification or a change in social behaviour. With the smoking ban, we have seen that we can meet with resistance and that we sometimes try to strike a balance where we should not. In my view, we should come down on the side of the simple principle that should underpin our approach to this issue - it saves lives. It is as simple as that, and this is what should guide us.

The ban on smoking in public premises and in the workplace has been a clear success in public health terms, but it would not have been possible without the years of widespread education of the public about the reality of lung cancer and the many other illnesses caused by smoking. A long battle was fought against the massive resources of the tobacco industry. That battle is not yet over and the Minister is still implementing positive measures in this area, which my party supports. While we do not have the same lobby on the issue of sunbeds, because the numbers are smaller, I am sure the Minister has been lobbied, as we all have been.

Smoking has both a social and a physical aspect. For some, there is a perceived social or peer pressure to smoke, although that has greatly diminished. Far more important is the physical addiction to tobacco that is so difficult for people to overcome. In contrast, the attraction of tanning with sunbeds is purely a product of social and cultural attitudes. It is about the body image favoured by many in our society, which is where we now need to focus our attention. Education on this issue is hugely important and should go hand in glove with the passing of this legislation. There is almost a compulsion for sections of our population to have a permanent tan because of the widespread perception that a tan is necessary in order to appear attractive and even healthy. I am sure if any of us were to take a walk down to a hotel in the city where a wedding was taking place, we would find many people with fake tans, including people under the age of 18, and this is not just the case at weddings but also at confirmations and communions. I would certainly not allow my child to use a sunbed, although if they reached the age of 18, they could make up their own mind. Hopefully, we will have moved to an outright ban before my children reach the age of 18. It is incredible to think that some people would allow their young children to lie on sunbeds, given the inherent and real dangers this poses to their health. It is obvious that education has to be part of this and that we have to educate the adults as well the children.

A very interesting survey was carried out last year among 243 transition year students at five County Sligo post-primary schools on their attitudes to skin cancer, sunbed use and tanning. The results were quite alarming. Of most concern is the belief among 73% of those surveyed that a sunbed tan provides a so-called safe base for a holiday tan, and the persistence of the myth among some that it is a cure for acne. The clinical nurse specialist in dermatology who carried out the Sligo survey said that while the long-awaited ban on sunbeds for those under the age of 18, provided for in this Bill, is to be welcomed, a nationwide sun awareness campaign is essential. I would certainly echo that call.

Legislation, to be effective, must go hand in hand with public education and awareness. In this regard, I commend the work of the Irish Cancer Society, which has done a great deal to expose the reality of what sunbeds mean for public health in Ireland. The statistics are grim. Up to nine out of ten cases of skin cancer are caused by ultraviolet radiation from the sun or from sunbeds. In 2009, the International Agency for Research on Cancer placed sunbeds in the highest category of cancer risk - as carcinogenic as tobacco and plutonium. The most common cancer in this country is skin cancer. More than 9,000 people were diagnosed with skin cancer in this State in 2010, nearly 900 of them with melanoma. There were more than 150 deaths from skin cancer in 2011. Obviously, all of these figures should be of great concern to us. Indeed, the incidence of melanoma is rising every year and the current rate is over 130% higher than that recorded in 1994. The risk of developing cancer as a result of sunbed use is greater among young people, yet the Irish Cancer Society researchers found that, in 2010, some 28,000 young people under the age of 25 used sunbeds in this State, many on a weekly basis.

To come back to the social attitudes which lead to sunbed use, 88% of those who use them are women, as Senator van Turnhout said earlier, and 20% are between the ages of 15 and 24. It is very clear that parents as well as children need to be educated about the dangers. No responsible parents who are properly informed of the high risk of cancer to which they are exposing their children would allow them to use sunbeds. It is appropriate, therefore, that a special focus of this Bill is the protection of children. I welcome the outright ban on the use of sunbeds by people under the age of 18. Welcome also is the new regulatory regime for a sector that has been unregulated up to now. I look forward to seeing these regulations put in place and implemented comprehensively, and I urge the Minister to ensure the necessary resources are in place to do so.

I am not certain of the wording of section 14(1) which enables the Minister to prescribe training leading to a qualification in the safe use of sunbeds - I believe that is the terminology used - which is recognised within the National Framework of Qualifications, or an equivalent qualification. Apart from the exempted area of phototherapy, surely the whole thrust of the Bill is that there is no safe use of sunbeds.

I had intended to say more, and I did not get to the discuss the amendments proposed by my colleague in the Dáil, Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin. We hope the Minister will accept them in good faith because they were proposed in order to enhance the Bill. We should move a step further and ensure that we do our best to save as many lives as possible, reduce the incidence of cancer and push down the figures and, crucially, save the taxpayer money as well as save lives. The Bill is to be welcomed and I commend the Minister on its introduction.