The Maori Affairs select committee has released its report on smoking. Most of its recommendations have been proposed here and elsewhere before:
– forcing tobacco companies to reveal the ingredients and chemicals in their products, cracking down on covert sponsorship by tobacco companies
– taking away the display stands and enforcing plain packaging
– high taxes and pumping the money into anti-smoking education/advertising (I would suggest making the industry fully-fund the future health costs of smoking now, like we do with ACC because if we do go smoke-free we’ll still be bearing the cost with no excise to pay it)
– limits on imports (I think Zet suggested that first) and reducing the amount that can be grown for personal use to a realistic level.
It’s about making smoking more costly, making the industry bear the costs that it is imposing on society, decreasing the attractiveness of cigarettes, and encouraging societal change.
It’s great to see politicians setting a really ambitious goal coupled with policies to achieve it. Labour and the Greens are on board. What about National? Well our Do Nothing PM, John ‘ambitious for New Zealand’ Key says it’s too hard.
Guess we need a government with some balls.
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