Canada: Manitoba Introduces Bill To Ban All Flavored Tobacco

[andrew]

Getting kids off flavoured tobacco

Minister introduces ban, eyes e-cigarettes if passed
Ben Otto was 16 when his co-worker offered him his first cigarette. It was a peach Bullseye.

"I just started mostly because of stress due to school. I was working 40 hours a week and still going to school, so it was tough," said the now 18-year-old West Kildonan Collegiate student after hearing the province is working toward banning flavoured tobacco products.

What began as a stress reliever has turned into a habit. He smokes five to 10 times a day and buys a pack of flavoured cigarettes every couple of weeks.

"I'd rather smoke flavoured tobacco than normal cigarettes," he said.

"It tastes good, and it kind of takes your mind off of everything."

Young smokers such as Otto drove Healthy Living Minister Sharon Blady to the Manitoba legislature Wednesday in hopes of banning flavoured cigarettes, cigarillos, cigars and loose tobacco.

"Flavours like candy, chocolate or fruit make tobacco much more attractive to children and youth, and they make it more likely that kids will experiment with tobacco and get hooked," said Blady at West Kildonan Collegiate.

She held up a marker and a flavoured cigarette with a colourful package that was about the same size as the marker.

"Can you tell the difference between the Crayola marker and the flavoured tobacco product? These are clearly marketed towards our youth."

Blady hopes the proposed amendment to the Non-Smokers Health Protection Act will come into effect before summer.

Otto doesn't.

"It's not their right to tell us what we should and shouldn't be able to do," he said, adding he would seriously consider quitting smoking if flavoured cigarettes were banned.

"Cigarette brands only go so far, but flavoured tobacco brings a different kind of flavour."

The proposed legislation would ban the popular flavoured cigar brands Otto smokes, such as Bullseye, Prime Time, Backwoods, Bluntarillo, Colts and Honey T.

Blady said the amendments are meant to address the loopholes in the federal Tobacco Act that allow companies to sell flavoured tobacco products.

The law defines cigarillos as cigars weighing 1.4 grams or less or having a cigarette filter. Many companies get around the law by making cigars that are more than 1.4 grams, which allows them to legally continue to add flavours to the product.

While flavoured-tobacco laws have sparked a heated debate between non-smokers and tobacco companies for years, some students at West Kildonan Collegiate have taken matters into their own hands.

Hayley Ward and Tessa Bortoluzzi are part of a group called Students Working Against Tobacco (S.W.A.T.) that regularly presents educational sessions about the negative effects of smoking to high school students.

The two 15-year-olds have been working with the group for the past two years to get their peers to stop smoking. They said their efforts have worked.

"We have an online survey that every single student takes and you can fill in a space where it says 'Have you ever smoked before or how often do you smoke?' and the numbers from last year to this year have significantly decreased," said Bortoluzzi.

Blady said if the legislation is passed, her next step will be to ban e-cigarettes, menthol tobacco products and flavoured smokeless tobacco.

danelle.cloutier@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition April 17, 2014 A2

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/getting-kids-off-flavoured-tobacco-255604541.html

I wonder where lakelands will fall? E-cigarettes are also a great success in getting people off of smoking cigarettes onto a water based vapor that delivers nicotine. I really don't see this bill passing, as well as the current goverment (NDP) has about a cold chance in Hell of getting re-elected. This is just some of the chaos we deal with in soviet Canuckistan, we have borderline hardcore socialists in power who want to keep spending money on things like Health care etc... and take away some of the biggest tax producing things at the same time. If anything kids should be encouraged to smoke away the deficit.

 

[anglesey]

I can't imagine pipe tobacco will have a problem with this, though it does depend very much on how the act itself is worded. The only problem I can forsee is as happens in the UK, and I imagine does in North America, in that unscrupulous retailers sell 'flavoured pipe tobacco' that is in fact rolling tobacco or rizla concept tobacco.
As for the article, the first young man made me laugh, he sounds like a hardcore smoker. Whatever happened to kids these days, when I started smoking at an unspeakably young age, I would've called you a puff if offered a flavoured cigarette. I agree with your anti socialist tilt though, the same thing plagues the UK government, but I'm hoping this will change.

 

[andrew]

No the only reason I took notice of it is because it states loose tobacco this time, there already is a law in place against flavored cigarettes, it's just that companies changed their product to get around it by making them over 1.4 grams, so now there's these flavored cigars that are 1.4 grams and over. Funny thing is when I started smoking if I had been smoking a peach flavored smoke I would of gotten bugged about being a wuss and is my wrist strong enough to hold that up? etc...... Then I would of just gone to plain smokes. Man the early 90's.

 

[northernneil]

They were talking about a similar law here in Alberta. After talking with my tobacconist he explained it was aimed at gas station sales and would no affect sales at tobacco retail locations.

 

[murf]

maybe the "loose tobacco" was meant to be chewing tobacco? Moist snuff? A little vague, but skoal has so many flavors, their newer citrus tastes just like gum. I started off chewing that flavored junk (when I was much too young). I prefer the straight, natural, unflavored kinds now (when I buy the occasional tin).
whether the law directly affects pipe tobacco or not, if passed, it could pave the way for pipe tobacco to be targeted next, especially if companies try to get around it by selling the RYO as pipe tobacco, as I believe anglesey said. The precedent would be set

 

[andrew]

I doubt they'll make distinctions based on snuff vs chewing vs ryo vs pipe tobacco, and when they passed the law the first time here regarding flavored cigarettes, even the B&M tobacconists had to stop selling them. The part I find very telling in the article is how it states they wouldn't try to ban menthol because the big tobacco companies have the funds to fight these laws in court. I'll be quite surprised if it passed, as the current NDP government has the lowest approval rating they've ever had since raising our sales tax and passing a law that basically states they can do it because they can, where before you had to hold a public referendum to raise the sales tax. And e-cigs aren't even tobacco so I think this is just more stuff that is going to help sink the NDP.

 

[cgrd]

I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but...
The laws that already on the books in this province prohibit sales and provision of tobacco to minors. Tobacco products must be screened from view at retailers, with the exception of businesses which prohibit minors (bars, tobacconists). Half that packaging must be dedicated to anti-smoking messaging.
The pending legislation above does not include chewing tobacco, snuffs, or menthol tobacco. It does not include an vape products, since they are illegal to sell under Health Canada regulations - but there's a tremendous grey market out there.
If you really wanted kids to not get cigarettes, you would enforce the laws on the books. Shut down the retailers that sell to kids with massive fines. Bring the full attention of the law to adults who buy for children. Detail a few patrol cars to confiscate and cite minors who are smoking outside the high schools. The laws exist for them to stop getting cigarettes to minors. But it's hard for your government to look like they're being proactive in solving a "problem" by using existing law.

 

[mso489]

Kids will smoke anything, literally anything, and they shouldn't. I hope it doesn't affect aromatic pipe tobacco.

Likewise, it shouldn't.

 

[tuold]

Oh my God! Somebody is enjoying something somewhere? We must put an end to that!

 

[salmonfisher]

Sadly, all tobacco's lead to cancer, they have the high ground on this one. It's without question that smoking a cig, cigar, pipe or packing snuff causes cancer.
Taxation increases should stop, tax revenue be put into policing n education for the underage smokers. It amazes me how not one of our officials recognizes that increased pricing only leads to grey market for which they get zero revenue from. I guess we found another native income source besides gambling. Yep, I order all my baccy from our southern neighbors, because it's a joke how our tobacco is 5x higher then in the states. I would gladly support a local B&M if our prices were more in line.
I used to smoke a pack a day@$7.00 tax revenue for our government. That's $2,400 beans they are not getting just from me. Start to multiply this out n it gets scary.
In NB, our resource revenue is paltry. Most of our lumber mills are closed now, we ship our tight grained, high quality softwood to Europe for processing. Whatever province has the balls to make weed legal n for sale at liquor stores will become richer then nfld n Alberta.
Grrrrrr...man this stuff irks me lol

 

[andrew]

Kids will smoke anything, literally anything, and they shouldn't. I hope it doesn't affect aromatic pipe tobacco.

We need to start banning teabags, banana peels, toothpaste, nutmeg, etc..... Good points Chris, I've seen it go from when I was a kid you could simply tell the convience store owner you were buying smokes for your mom/dad at 5 years old to getting more strict with "we'll need to see a note" to "we need at least the useless part of your older brothers drivers license" to the lucrative "I'll give you 2-4 smokes if you buy me a pack" to some headbanger smoking outside a convenience store that was 18. They are pretty good at enforcing id now, it's just kids are always going to smoke and find a way for someone who's of legal age to buy them smokes. If they ban flavored smokes kids will just go back to smoking regular smokes. Either way people are going to smoke. I've watched people say when it went to 6$ a pack they would quit soon and are still smoking and it's close to 15$ a pack now.

Tobacco products must be screened from view at retailers, with the exception of businesses which prohibit minors (bars, tobacconists). Half that packaging must be dedicated to anti-smoking messaging.

This is one of my favorites, now you just have some stores with shower curtains up hiding the smokes to drawers they're in, and no matter how big they make the nasty image or how hard they try to hide the smokes, people still go to the store to buy a pack of smokes, and it's not like not seeing them makes them forget they've gone to go get smokes.

 

[peckinpahhombre]

Whatever province has the balls to make weed legal n for sale at liquor stores will become richer then nfld n Alberta.

Unfortunately the legalization of marijuana in Canada will be determined at the federal, not provincial, level. The feds have jurisdiction over matters of criminal law and drug control.

 

[igloo]

How the hell are you going to make grape blunts in Canada now .

 

[andrew]

How the hell are you going to make grape blunts in Canada now .

There's already sprays that change the taste. So another cog in the wheel ready to take off before they even ban flavored tobacco.

 

[skapunk1]

GsThis is another step backwards for Canada.
I bought my E-cigarette kit last week. Ive smoked cigs for 24 years, tried quitting numerous times. Ive had lung surgery cause smoking caused a cluster of cysts to form on the top of my left lung. They hemorrhaged, my lung colapsed, and my chest cavity filled with blood. I almost kicked the bucket in 2001.
Quit for a year, started back up.
I tried the gum, the patch, hypnosis....nothing worked.
Now I have an alternative system, where all the harmful chemicals are taken out, and I have complete control of my intake.
Today is day 10. I went from weening myself off of cigarettes to the past 3 days, where my brain says to light up a smoke....i do....and it tastes absolutely disgusting. I loved smoking, but half of that love was taste and feel of smoke in my mouth.
So....im off the cigs. No more urges because I have a substitute that's allowing me to reprogram my brain with easy.
Now my government wants to try and take this life saving alternative away....sickening.
I also find that I really enjoy my daily pipe time, even more than before.
Warren

 

[murf]

cgrd hit the nail on the head. Enforce the laws that already exist. This can go for anything like alcohol or firearms as well.
I'm hoping that tobacco still stays relatively safe due to one thing: Taxes. How could a government, with half a brain, ban something that brings in so much money?
If aromatics were to be banned, I would miss them for sure. I know that a good chunk of the forum members here don't even smoke aros, but a good number of us do. I smoke a little bit of everything. There was a thread I found (but I'll be darned if I can find it now) about making your own aromatics. I was thinking of giving it a try. P&C has the My Own Blend, but they don't offer a bourbon topping, so I was thinking of adding it myself. It would come as a non-aro, and I could add the flavoring myself. Just a thought, a little off-topic sorry

 

[andrew]

Congrats warren, I know a few people who have gone from cigs to e-cigs and quit smoking the same day. I highly doubt they'll be able to successfully ban them, also adding bourban/whisky to a blend is extremely easy to do.

 

[salmonfisher]

One could argue a ban on breathing in mill towns....

 

[kanada]

They were talking about this tonight on the news(Calgary, Alberta). I didn't realize they had this bill/amendment drafted Dec 2013. The link shows what the amendment would be, for any curious people. The definitions are extremely vague too...
http://www.qp.alberta.ca/documents/Acts/2013ch25_unpr.pdf