Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and thank you to our witnesses for coming today.
To counter cigarette smuggling, the cost of a federal licence to manufacture tobacco products could be increased from $5,000 to $5 million. The Bloc Québécois has been making that suggestion for a long time. Is anyone listening? We will certainly see someday. But we see that the witnesses are in agreement with our suggestion.
In the summary of your amendments, Mr. Cunningham, the one that had to do with a ban on menthol cigarillos, menthol blunt wraps and menthol smokeless tobacco caught my attention. I was extremely surprised when I read the bill. I completely agree with Mr. McKibbon about the way people start smoking cigarettes. I am not very old. I played on the football team at my high school, and many of my teammates started with chewing tobacco, cigarillos and other products.
Earlier the officials from the department told us that the bill does not cover menthol flavoured tobacco because menthol cigarettes have been around for a very long time. Chewing tobacco goes back to the 1700s or 1800s. Why would we create an exception for menthol but not for the rest? Why did the government and the officials not include all oral tobacco products and smokeless tobacco products in the bill?