Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak today on the motions in GroupNo. 2 that were put forward by my colleague from Macleod. We are faced with a difficult dilemma.
The dilemma in this bill is how we address decreasing consumption, particularly among youth and dealing with the purchase of cigarettes in shops. Is it fair to criminalize those individuals who unknowingly sell cigarettes to minors or is it fairer to put the responsibility on the individual who goes into the store with the knowledge they are committing an illegal act? My colleague from Macleod and I feel it is more important to put the responsibility and the onus on the child who buys cigarettes and who knows full well he is committing an illegal act.
That is why the motions in Group No. 2 were put forward by my colleague, putting a $75 dollar summary conviction fine on underage children who buy cigarettes.
We have heard a lot today on the issue of sponsorship. The ultimate goal of this bill should be to decrease tobacco consumption with all Canadians, particularly youth. We know we can have the greatest effect in decreasing consumption in youth. Tobacco consumption and the addiction to tobacco products occurs when somebody is a child, particularly around the ages of 11 to 14. The consumption of as little as one pack of cigarettes or sometimes even less can ensure that a child is addicted for life.
Over the term of this government, the statistics have been very interesting in a number of areas. One area is the decrease in cost this government effected when it decreased tobacco taxes in February 1994, a move we vehemently opposed. We opposed this because decreasing the tobacco tax was the single most important negative health move that any government in the past 50 years has made.
The negative effect of this move cannot be underestimated. Lowering the cost of cigarettes has introduced 250,000 children to cigarettes each year. They will be addicted for life. Half of them will ultimately die an early death. A great percentage will suffer morbidity from a wide variety of diseases, from chronic obstructive lung disease to angina to a number of other malignancies, which there is not enough time to speak of today.
This is the fate that awaits those children in the future and that is the legacy this government has given to the Canadian people. This is what it has done for their health.
This government was warned by Health Canada. A Health Canada study was conducted by Drs. Morrison, Mao, Wigle and Villeneuve entitled "The Impact of Cigarette Price Rollback on the Future Health of Canadian Adolescents". I will quote from the summary:
Government tobacco control in Canada has had three main components: health promotion campaigns, high tobacco taxes and restrictive policies on public smoking. Even the temporary abandonment of high cigarette taxes will likely lead to a large number of teenagers becoming and/or remaining smokers. The health consequences of the recent tax decrease will continue for decades.
That study, which was given to the minister in 1995, illustrated very clearly, succinctly and scientifically that the impact of a tobacco tax rollback would be utterly devastating to the health and welfare of Canadians, but in particular to the health and welfare of Canadian children. The government has also been inactive in the area of advertising.
The Supreme Court in its wisdom, and I use that very sarcastically because I cannot think of a greater affront to Canadians and a greater lack of responsibility than the Supreme Court has demonstrated through twisting the charter of rights and freedoms, turned down the advertising ban on smoking advertising. What has been the effect of that? Let us take a look.
The data of the last year show in 1996 alone that the lack of a ban on tobacco advertising has been enough to support 250,000 new smokers in this country. The per capita increase has been anywhere from 3 to 4 per cent in this country as a result of not allowing the ban on tobacco advertising itself.
To colleagues from the Bloc Quebecois, I ask them to take a look at this very clearly and it will demonstrate without a shadow of a doubt that the ban on advertising that has been removed has caused an increase in consumption. They should be more concerned than anybody else because the children in Quebec take up smoking earlier and smoke more than children in any other province in this country. Those are the facts.
We have to do something in this House. We have to deal with the epidemic of smoking. The tobacco sponsorship provisions in the bill are okay. We are holding our noses and supporting the bill only because nothing has been done on the tobacco issue in this country for three years. For three years while a quarter of a million kids pick up the habit the government has been diddling around doing nothing.
The health minister would rather deal with banning certain types of soft cheeses than with a health epidemic that claims 40,000 lives every year. What does that say about the commitment of this government to the health of Canadians? If I were them I would be truly embarrassed.
Certainly back in 1994 we had a smuggling epidemic but here is another problem that the government failed to deal with properly. Instead of dealing with the smuggling issue which actually occurs unfortunately on many aboriginal reserves in Quebec, instead of dealing with the smuggling conduits which deal not only with tobacco but also deal with guns, with alcohol, with drugs and with tobacco and people, the government has chosen to put its head in the sand and not address the criminals and the thugs who are
engaging in this and who are associated closely with the gangs in the United States.
Instead of dealing with the thugs, the government has chosen to compromise the health and welfare of all Canadians and in particular the children of this country by rolling back the tobacco taxes. The government has put its tail between its legs and said "we are not going to enforce the law, we are going to compromise the health of Canadians and make it look like we are doing something".
A plan for the health of Canadians and a plan to decrease consumption and a plan to address the smuggling was there and it is as follows. One, bring the tobacco taxes back where they were in January 1994. Two, put forth an export tax which would decrease the smuggling of tobacco. Three, enforce the law to address and arrest those individuals who are committing crimes and who are smuggling all across this country.
The government fails to recognize the law-abiding aboriginal people who live on these reserves who have to put up with thugs in their midst who are engaging in these illicit, illegal practices. No one talks about the culture of fear that many of those people live in. It is an abrogation of the responsibility of this government to not address that problem. It is an abrogation of the responsibility of this government to put its own political fortunes ahead of the health of Canadians.
The government should be ashamed of itself and the Canadian people should understand what is going on here. The plan was there but the government chose to ignore it.
I hope that our colleagues from the Bloc Quebecois will unite with our colleagues in the Reform Party and I hope some members of the Liberal Party to put forth a better solution to address the smuggling issue, decrease consumption of cigarette smoking in this country and enable us to all live in a healthier and happier environment, if not for ourselves then in particular for the health and welfare of our children.