Sadly, my own experience validates this finding. My 21-year-old son, who was successfully inoculated against smoking cigarettes by his parents and of course by his schooling, did not equate cigarillo use with what he knew to be the health risks of smoking. And who can blame him or his peers when cigarillos come in candy and cocktail flavours that mask the harsh tobacco taste, when they are sold in singles and kiddie-sized packs at youth-friendly prices, and when, as in the case of singles, they have no health warning at all?
The Non-Smokers' Rights Association strongly endorses the measures in Bill C-32 that would ban flavouring in cigarillos, cigarettes, and blunts and would require these products to be sold in packs of 20. We assume that the new health warning regulations currently being drafted will remedy the situation regarding the woefully inadequate warnings currently on cigarillos.
Although my organization's top priority is to see Bill C-32 pass before the House recesses for the summer, there is one amendment that we strongly urge members to support. As you've just heard from Sam McKibbon with Flavour…GONE!, flavoured, smokeless tobacco is another product that targets kids and starts them on a dangerous path toward a lifelong addiction to tobacco. Like cigarillos, smokeless products come in a vast array of innocuous candy and fruit flavours, and in a very quick trip to a local convenience store I was able to find a number of candy products that look just like Skoal. I challenge you to tell from a distance which is which.
Like cigarillos, smokeless products come in a vast array of innocuous candy and fruit flavours and are packaged to resemble tins of candies, mints, and gum. While use of smokeless tobacco by youth Canada-wide is low, this statistic is misleading. As you have heard, there are specific demographic and geographic clusters of adolescents with very high rates of use—for example, youth in northern Ontario, in Alberta, in native communities, and youth who play sports such as hockey. Once again, many of these kids would not have considered smoking, but for many reasons, including the candy flavours, they did not associate smokeless tobacco with the dangers of tobacco use. Once again, my own 16-year-old son is included in this group. I asked him last night how many of his peers use smokeless tobacco, and he said basically all of them do. I asked if he would use this product if it didn't come in flavours, and he said no.
Members of Parliament have the opportunity to close the huge loophole that currently exists for flavoured, smokeless tobacco products and thereby ensure that the exponential increase in use of flavoured cigarillos by youth that we saw in recent years is not repeated with smokeless tobacco.
I would like to say a few words about the contraband tobacco problem, which I know is a major concern for members of Parliament, as it is for the health community. The extent of the contraband market in Canada is not a reason to refrain from implementing progressive tobacco control measures such as Bill C-32. Rather, the extent of the contraband market justifies urgent and concerted action by government. Health groups have been advocating for some time for the government to implement a comprehensive set of measures that would severely limit contraband, and in so doing would protect public health. In fact, just today my organization is sending to members of Parliament our latest publication on this issue, which outlines a very comprehensive approach that we are urging the government to adopt. You should have that any day now.
In closing, I would like to commend the government for its leadership on this issue as well as recognize the support given by members from other parties, in particular Ms. Wasylycia-Leis. The Non-Smokers' Rights Association urges members of the committee and indeed all members of Parliament to ensure that this important piece of legislation is passed before the House rises for the summer. We also urge you to support an amendment to include smokeless tobacco products in the schedule of tobacco products to which the flavouring ban would apply.
Thank you. Merci.