moved for leave to introduce Bill C-348, An Act to amend the Tobacco Act (cigarillos, cigars and pipe tobacco).
Mr. Speaker, the bill is about the health and well-being of Canada's youth.
Parliaments of Canada have worked hard over the years to reduce smoking addiction and to curb marketing of cigarettes but big tobacco keeps finding loopholes to the Tobacco Act, trying to lure our children and youth into a lifelong addiction to cigarettes.
The latest is flavoured cigarillos sold individually or in kiddie packs in colourful and hip packages, priced at just a buck or two. The results are devastating. Cigarillo sales have skyrocketed and smoking rates among youth are going up.
The bill would change all of that. It would ban flavoured tobacco products, require cigarillos to be sold in packages of 20 instead of individually and demands tough warning labels.
Colleagues on all sides of the House support the bill. When I introduced this bill in the last Parliament, the Prime Minister made an election promise to do just that. I would say to the Conservatives that they should take this bill and make it their own.
I want to thank the Action on Tobacco Coalition and all the young people who have worked on this bill, including the Manitoba Youth for Clean Air, the Sister Teens against Nicotine and Drugs, the Northwestern Youth Action Alliance and the Eastern Ontario Youth Coalition. The bill is for them. Together we can make a difference.
(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)