The government of Trinidad and Tobago has yielded to pressure and agreed to drop some of the measures in its proposed tobacco control legislation.Health Minister Jerry Narace told the Senate Tuesday he regrets having to pull back on some of the harsher penalties but said he had to do it in order to get the legislation passed.
Narace withdrew the provision for hefty fines and/or prison terms for selling single cigarettes, which would have affected street vendors and the poor who could not afford to buy packs of cigarettes.
He also announced changes to harsh penalties for a number of offences, including the prohibition of sales by minors, public displays of tobacco products and on the sales of tobacco products in certain places.
The penalty for these offences, on summary conviction, has been reduced from a fine of $100,000 to $50,000 for the first offence; from $200,000 to $100,000 for the second offence and $300,000 to $100,000 and imprisonment for nine months for the third offence.
In defending the legislation, Attorney General John Jeremie said there are "very powerful interests at work" in the tobacco industry that oppose the government's moves to protect the population.
He said this "tobacco complex" had been planning for years to fight the bill.
"This complex is as powerful as the complex which drives the war machines in certain parts of the world," he charged.
Independent Senator Gail Merhair raised an interesting point regarding the bill's definition of consent for smokers.
She noted that the age of consent for sex is 16 while the age for smoking is 18 and asked: ":Is Government saying it is okay to have consensual sex, but not to smoke?"
She also had concerns about enforcement of the clause banning smoking within 15 metres of a school when schools are sometimes located near public facilities such as taxi stands and even private homes.
Merhair wanted to know if she would be liable to fine and/or imprisonment if someone was smoking on the driveway in front of her office.
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