Parliament has just voted to raise the excise tax on tobacco with the hope to reduce consumption amongst New Zealanders. I for one think that credit should be given when its due! This one goes to Tariana! Health and well-being is a matter of personal responsibility but I have witnessed first hand the impact of smoking amongst my whanau. There is alot of work to do and when statistics tell us that 5000 NZers die each year from smoking related illnesses urgent action is necessary. 46% of smokers are Maori a high percentage are women and far too many die as a result and that’s without second hand smoking taking its toll! This is the type of measure that will be felt throughout many communities – Let’s make sure that the future for Maori is a smoke-free one!
The only that will work is if enough money is pumped into schemes/programmes that help people quit and stay quit.
I quit smoking over 10 years ago, cold turkey, and by God it was tough. I still have dreams about smoking…
The only that will work is if enough money is pumped into schemes/programmes that help people quit and stay quit.
I quit smoking over 10 years ago, cold turkey, and by God it was tough. I still have dreams about smoking…
Exactly who are you giving credit to Nanaia?
Unfortunately the Government eschewed similar suggestions and evidence presented regarding alcohol. The contradiction is particularly stark given the timing. It’s hard to attribute this apparent contradiction to anything other than a strong alcohol lobby.
If you think for one minute that this initiative will significantly reduce the number of Maori smokers, you are seriously deluded.
I’d rather try to do something than nothing wouldn’t you??
Good point Tariana deserves some credit! The Maori Affairs Select Committee for their Inquiry also!
Tracey says: “It’s hard to attribute this apparent contradiction to anything other than a strong alcohol lobby.”
Or perhaps the fact that the vast majority of people who use alcohol do so without causing harm or discomfort either to themselves or to those around them. The same statement cannot be made about tobacco.
Unfortunately it will have wrong effect.
When an addicted smoker has a choice between 1kg mince and 1kg spuds for the kids meal or a pack of ciggies, the ciggies will win and the kids get a pack of potato chips for tea. Remember all smokers are addicts.
The social implications of this terrible legistation is horrendous.
Murray M: even a 5-10% reduction is going to save a tonne of health dollars.
If there are budget problems resulting then whanau ora provides one way of coping with that. As the combined group -will note that health policy is to reduce smoking and the well-being of the children requires adequate financial support.
Besides smoking and the affordability of food issue does not explain buying potato chips rather than the cheaper potatoes. The “investment” in potatoes provides cheaper food. Hopefully whanau ora will help focus on adequate resources to invest in good food investment that deliver cheaper food over the longer term.
It is also true that smoking rates amongst all groups have been falling, and this effort is worth completing.
Hopefully the money from the increased tax will go to giving up smoking campaigns – through whanau ora?
1 X packet per day x $16 = $112 per week! How I wish I still smoked! Then I could give it up and save $5,824 per year. Wow!
George, 70,000 people are sexually or physically assaulted in this country each year with a main causative factor being alcohol.
The vast majority dont drive drunk but we still try to stop those who do.
What happened to the draft legislation on Point of Sale displays/advertising???
This was the centerpiece of the policy up until the point of bill’s introduction.
I think it’s good if less Maori and others smoke. I just don’t like the heavy handed – you must quit smoking or burn a hole in your pocket approach that will send true addicts broke.
E hika ma! To kuare hoki!
“I’d rather try to do something than nothing wouldn’t you??”
How about micro-chipping smokers? That stopped dog attacks, didn’t it? Oh wait….
Better tax sugar, fat and all dairy products since Maori disproportionately suffer from diabetes and dietary related ailments. What’s stopping you, Nanaia?
I am all ways amazed that Tobacco isnt forced to remove all the additives , like honey etc that make the smoking palatable.I think there is about 30+ additives commonly added to Tobacco.
A lot more people would give up smoking if raw unaltered tobacco is only sold. It would be unsmokable to most teenagers especially.
Hit the taste and you have solved the problem , or is the government like the rabbit shooters, who dont really want to exterminate all the rabbits.
heres a US list of additives to cigarettes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_additives_in_cigarettes
Geez Spud, it’s good to look after the environment but having an Act and Regulations to enforce such actions seems heavy handed, couldn’t we just let people do as they please and trust the majority wont stuff up the environment?
@ Maori Smoker – agreed.
@Tracey – I can see the need for rules for the environment. But for smoking as long as they are keeping it away from non smokers then it is their business. And they should be allowed to find their own way to quit when they want to.
For those who want it, here is a summary of the Law Commission findings
http://www.lawcom.govt.nz/UploadFiles/Publications/Publication_154_465_Press%20Release%20Alcohol%20in%20our%20Lives%20R114.pdf
Spud, do you feel the same way about drugs?
People cant smack their children but they can smoke around them? Do the children get to say “no” to the passive smoking?
No one, as I understand it, is looking to ban drinking.
Tracey says: “No one, as I understand it, is looking to ban drinking.”
For goodness sake, Tracey.
No one is trying to ban drinking because most people who do it do it responsibly and with little effect on their health.
Smoking is entirely different.
Tracey says: “People cant smack their children but they can smoke around them”
I agree with you Tracey – we’ve certainly got that the wrong way round, haven’t we?
Touche George re smacking
Jokes aside George do you read about what alcohol fuelled people do to othe rpeople and property in this country? The cost in health insurance and other terms is far bigger than, say, the cost of doing cleaning once a week for osme lederly people.
This will make no difference to the number of smokers and is just another tax grab with the bonus to National of being another sweetener to the Maoris. If they were serious there would be a $5 increase but $1 at a time will make little or no difference.
This has come about due to the incompetence of the Min. of Health who have been wasting $55 million a year on tobacco control and the actual number of smokers has been rising for years. The main tool to help smokers quit is nicotine replacement therapy. Patches and gum. They still do not understand that giving more nicotine to a smoker is just plain stoopid.
There are other options, such as Champix, that are really effective but are ignored and the money keeps being given to groups like ASH and co that have their noses firmly in the trough. I once tried to offer some advise as I know a bit about the industry but the MoH just got snarky as I had pointed out how useless they are.
I feel sorry for the poor bloody dairy owners.
Tracey – I agree with you about the damage caused by some people who misuse alcohol. But I disagree that it is a problem that is similar in nature to smoking, that’s all.
Just as we don’t govern cars to travel at 40km/h or less because some people drive like lunatics, so we shouldn’t punish everyone just because some drink irresponsibly.
I just wish folks would stop using bogus faux-statistics in relation to shoking. 5000 New Zealanders do NOT die each year from smoking related illnesses. 5000 New Zealanders who die have a smoking related illness. Very different.
“Spud, do you feel the same way about drugs?” – No, because tobacco is legal, but I do feel sorry for drug addicts.
“Do the children get to say “no” to the passive smoking?” – If I had my way no one would smoke around children, in their cars, or at bus stops. I hate passively smoking somebody else’s poison. However I do know how addictive the stuff is and how hard it is to quit. If a person is going to quit then I’m in favour of them finding what works best for them, rather than it being done by force.
“No one, as I understand it, is looking to ban drinking.” Tracey, you have made my day
Yes, George and with smoking everyone else has to ingest it as well and the poisons hang around (see ads teach stuff).
It just comes down to decency, if you’re going to drink then don’t be a d***.
@Pentwig “The social implications of this terrible legistation is horrendous.”
Yep, I tend to agree with you – its not that relevant how I personally feel about smoking – been there, done that. But all that aside, Pentwig is correct – having spent much of my time with the kids whose parents are going to be most hit by this increase – it will simply add to levels of poverty, stress (ever seen someone come off ciggies – for some its very hard to settle the frustration – so combine this frustration of no smokes, no money to buy them – the result will be more domestic violence as the kids cop it)and hardship.
IT would be nice to think that this will work – and I can live in hope – but in the rush to push this through I am not sure that Tariana and the other ‘anti smokers’ out there have actually thought this through.
Lets think logically here for a minute – incentives, support and the odd carrot work – for all things – but hitting someone with a stick is not all that effective.
I guess doing something is better than doing nothing – but the cynic in me cant help but see this as a recession buster – not a health initiative.
Thanks for actually shedding a little light on the debate Jennifer. That’s a good piece of information.
Here are a couple of contrarian articles on smoking. I can’t vouch for their veracity, but I think them interesting nonetheless. Smoking Trials Again and The Scientific Scandal of Antismoking
We should also remember while this hysteria is being whipped up about smoking that, as Tracey is trying to say, alcohol is actually more harmful (see graph here). However, I certainly do not support any of the extreme conservative views about alcohol on display here.
No surprises that Labour supports this despicably conservative move and yet more to raise the cost of living for those on low incomes.
No full-time smoker will quit as a result of this. Tax increase while living costs are already high for people at the bottom
If health and well-being is a matter of personal responsibility, why the need for the tax hike?
People die younger if they have a smoking related illness – why is that no surprise.
Full time smokers? No probably not. But The World Bank organisation of all people shows that higher “tobacco tax” (as it’s known) does curb smoking, not by directly proportional amounts e.g. a 10% increase doesn’t immediately lead to 10% stopping smoking, but there is a positive correlation, and even better it STRONGLY dissuades new smokers (i.e. kids) from taking it up. Countries successful at reducing smoking have 2/3 to 4/5 of the price of a pack of ciggies made up of tax.
However it seems to also be true from their studies that a minority of hardcore smokers do NOT stop with any amount of higher tobacco tax hikes, and will often turn to “substitute” products or simply sacrifise to keep their habit, and drive demand for an underground market.
We were already at that level of taxation about 70% or thereabouts.
Incidentally even before this tax increase smokers paid more than their fair share for the cost to the health system. Interestingly I saw a link to this paper on how smokers overestimate the risk of smoking.
80% of the cost of a packet was tax (now it would be moving towards a higher level). The tax is going up in 3 installments. A further 10% in 2011 and 2012, taking it to 90%+ tax. A packet a day – $7 a week increase now and a further $7 a week next year and a further $7 a week the year after that.
At that sort of tax rate, California could solve its budget problems by legalising marijuana.
The most effective policy is of course to ban sale of tobacco smokes to those not registered as addicts (thus no one currently under 18 would ever be able to legally buy the product). Supplying existing addicts by prescription/ration card (buying the product directly off the supplier as we do drugs) rather than via goods on sale to the public. This ends any point to advertising the product or even labelling the packet. Addicts being offered treated for their addiction whenever they receive supply. Some people, rather then register as addicts would stop using and buying the product.
@ ghostwhowalksnz: After reading your link about tobacco additives, I’m tempted to up my fag intake. With beetroot, cardamom, carrot, star anise, honey, basil adn the rest I’m really getting my five-plus a day.
It’s not a gain for ALL maori.
Maori who stop smoking will gain (not lose actually) and maori who do not stop smoking will lose more.
That’s just the headline of the article exposed and debunked as blatantly untruthful.
I can’t be bothered going any further.
I think we should take a bit of time to remember the cultural attributes of smoking while the puritans, wishing to enforce their barbaric and primitive ideals of conformity, regimentation and mystical authority worship, try to snuff it out. Take this for instance: Nicotine Chic: Writers as Smokers
Beautiful. And I’m a non-smoker.
That beautiful, thanks QTR.
There are people who like to be beaten or beat someone to have some kind of (cough) gratification, so as long as these people team up it’s all good…
IF the tax take from cigarettes equals or exceeds the known costs of having smokers in our community AND I dont have to breathe it in, all good I guess. Chalk one up to the beauty of liberty and the stupid things we do with it.
I’m also not saying ban alcohol, drink if you want to drink, in moderation or excess, but there are consequences. We all say we want to be able to drink in moderation (or in Spud’s case have the right to drink to excess in a friendly way) but undeniably alcohol can cause problems for society so ther eare consequences. Sorry to the well behaved drinkers, but the few spoil it for the many. Some on this threa dbehave as though that construct only applies to alcohol and they act appalled.
sorry, to clarify my S & M example above, if they engage with a partner who doesnt enjoy it, it becomes assault. The line crossed with excess alcoholis less defined but we can still draw a line.
The idea some have that alcohol is not harmful to others (passive smoking) I implore you to read up on domestic violence when drunkeness is absolutely imposed on the innocent.
In a discussion with my students yesterday someone asked what would be wrong with a world without alcohol… I said the level of self medication by alcohol in this country would suggest we might actually have a more violent society if joe and josephine NZ could “take the edge off” with a drink. So you see, I am capableof seeing both sides.
“sorry, to clarify my S & M example above”
?????
I think you mean “couldn’t.” And there are definitely people out there who are naturally highly strung and are able to get some relief by having a beer. And people who work hard and mellow out with a drink.
It’s not technically the drunkeness that is imposed, it’s the effect that the alcohol has had on the perpetrator. You can’t passively drink unless you’re in the womb. (Just being
).
pedantic
The violence thing is sad, I’m guessing those people have other problems that are merely brought out by the alcohol.
Also, some people are fine on wine but give them spirits and they turn…