The new government’s decision to repeal NZ’s groundbreaking Smokefree law has created shockwaves here and overseas. Where does it leave Māori? We ask experts to see if the evidence stacks up.
Oh yeah, the old Ronald Reagan line about how we're better off having no government assistance with anything. Until it's you who needs it, and then all of a sudden...
Replace the word cigarettes with the word alcohol and you would get the same result if you had a prohibition. Organised crime would take over, himicides and organised crime would be rampant. We just have to look back at history
Replace the word cigarettes with the word cannabis and then what? But this isn't the same as a simple prohibition since it was a gradual phasing out. And it's tobacco, which isn't actually any fun.
A Canadian program that educated kids on the predatory, manipulative marketing of cigarettes to young people was very successful in stopping them from taking up the habit. Unfortunately the vaping industry, now owned by big tobacco, is fully geared at 'trapping' young people.
Its simple were not keen on an enveitable blackmarket for tobacco. Would interested to see what evidence you would have to suggest crime rates wouldn't soar. Kiwis would feel less safe, cost of living wouldn't go down as money as tax money will have to be used to curb it, all for what a lack of self-responsibility? Nats logically won't change their mind case closed.
Only just found your channel Moana - loving your interviews & the interesting people & topics. As a health professional I hate this. It's an even worse twist of the knife that these tax cuts won't even be going to those that need it, only the very wealthy. It's just vile. Nice to see a bit of your band again too btw. Your version of Tihore Mai is my favourite. 😊
Luxon says that banning tabacco will just cause it to go underground. Keeping it legal will regulate it and bring in tax revenue. Then do the same for cannibis. Same logic applies. You either ban both or legalise both.
One of the issues I remember Luxon mentioning was Ram raids. He was concerned there would be an increase in ram raids if less dairies were allowed to sell cigarettes. What I had understood was that the ram raids were being done primarily by children/under 18s. This age group can't buy cigarettes now anyway so if the issue with changing smokefree laws is about cigarettes being harder to access causing more ram raids then surely they should be dropping the smoking age to that of the youngest involved in ram raids. That'll fix all the problems right? Maybe they should be funding them for people who can't afford them too just to make sure there's no crime involved in getting them.
I don't smoke, never have, never will but if someone wants to sit in their own home and smoke a cigarette why shouldn't they? Besides, alcohol causes more deaths on roads and family violence yet there is no comparable proposal to ban booze! Why not?
Personal responsibility is such a cop out answer and also a tabacco industry talking point. Cigarettes are an addictive carcinogen and we regualte almost every good and service to some degree.
@@Ryan-wb1jc Ooof, pathetic reply. Dyou drive a car without safety features, on roads without speed limits, and live in a house without asbestos or lead paint?
@@CUZZABRO have you ever been to any of the Southeast Asian countries? Go out on the road and it's a total chaos; no speed signs, no traffic lights and no road markings. But people still navigate their way without apparent govt interventions. People lent their sovereignty to the elected MPs to carry out their wishes and the last govt totally betrayed that trust.
The most dangerous product available most certainly is not tobacco, alcohol is far more dangerous , drunk people kill and maim other people through accidents fights etc a smoker by and large kills themselves. I do not smoke and have no interest in it. out-casting people has never been an answer for any issues/problems.
How about, sort out your own shit in your own communities and stop relying on the Govt to do the hard part for you? Teach your kids the right way and own your own failures within your own communities. This is 2023 , not the 1960s in New Zealand. We are LONG past "Systematic Racism" even being a thing in NZ today in 2023.
@AnthonyFlack I did mean systemic racism, try punching that in to YT and the auto correct tries for "systematic" first, yup and I missed it, either way , you got the point n it still stands.
Prohibition doesn't work. Take a looks at the history of alcohol prohibition and the growth of organized crime. That your evidence that the policy to repeal smokefree law is the correct one.
Tobacco needs to stay away from the Black Market or we will see more Māori and PI’s in jails. What’s happened to teaching your kids not to smoke? The government should not be teaching you what you should do or not do. You change the environment you are in.
Guess what, you'll never stop young people from doing stuff their parents told them not to do. You don't think there would be a black market? I just wonder how many of these people smoke recreational cannabis (it is illegal after all) and want it decriminalized.
The law would have made criminals and as such Maori and Pacific Islanders would be the ones that face the brunt of the law. Spent all of my adult life supporting the decriminalisation of cannabis, watching the previous government try this was one of the saddest things I have ever witnessed.
It's not really smoke free though is it, because people just vape now. It's just a law pretending to be smoke free. Virtue signaling while doing nothing.
This Government does not care about Maori. This Govt wont last. Dr Reti. . . some Doctor huh. You're a sell out bro. I hope HE get's stripped of his Medical Qualifications.
I think it’s more about educating people to make the choice not to smoke. This law was ridiculous. Doing this starts a precedent that leads to some pretty scary things. What’s to stop them saying only 1 car per household… or only 1 child to ‘save the environment’. Not to mention the control the gangs would have if you banned cigarettes for 2000 kids. It’s ludicrous. All these people don’t actually care about outcomes. It’s just virtue signaling. Before anyone talks smack I’ve worked as a doctor for 5 years now and have an interest in cardiovascular risk factors.
Yeah and what's to stop them from saying no more elections? And what's to stop them from sending all their critics to firing squads? And what's to stop them reappointing Jacinda to be dictator for life and then she starts dressing exactly like Hitler and calling herself Jacinda Hitler? Because if the government says dairies can't sell cigarettes, that's basically what will happen, and it will be all the woke left's fault, won't it?
I stopped smoking. Many others have also. It is not illegal therefore a personal choice. The Labour government wanted to legalise marijuana, a mind altering substance which also contains large amounts of tar - a lung damaging material. Hypocrisy and political opportunism is evident here. If you are too weak to stop smoking tobacco do not blame others.
The general theme seems to be 'narrative enforcement'. Often enough, if one goes to other more balanced media, one will see a great many 'commenters'(public) saying that people should be allowed to smoke; that we should not so readily 'condemn' them irrespective of the motives in so doing. But in the main stream, it's all just a one way ticket. Hardly ever, any balance to speak of. Echo chambers. Nick Wilson of Otago University who featured in this video is part of the Public Health Expert blog that the University publishes. They publish various papers of supposed tobacco research, and models, with opinions from the supposed experts. They invite members of the public to 'comment'. However, if any such comment offers up any criticism, poses questions that have inconvenient answers, or is contrary to what the 'experts' are putting forth, then the comment can be, 'deleted' for no other reason than that it provides for balance and indeed basic representation of the facts, ie drive 'it' underground and see crime proliferate(obviously). That right there is a major problem in NZ in that specific narratives are enforced as a means of manufacturing alleged consent, not to mention that such censoriousness is a violation of basic human rights in lieu of 'freedom of expression'. If the strength of ones argument is contingent on 'cancelling' the opposition, or not allowing constructive criticism, I would humbly suggest that is a castle made of sand and is anti-thesis to the entire basis of education itself, especially when this concerns a University which has a mission statement('open debate') which similarly contradicts the reality in terms of their censorship; not to mention how this harms the principles of democracy(open information) too on that basis. Pie in the sky? I will tell you what is pie in the sky. That would be the massive herd of elephants in the room. Those factors which are seldom seen to be spoken, due to the aforementioned. What I refer to for example, is 'alcohol'. Do we propose lowering the content of the alcohol so that eventually it is zero and therefore it would now pose no harm? Do beer drinkers drink more by volume than whiskey drinkers? Why surely, the question reveals the answer regards the suggestion of lowering nicotine levels. Which by the way, has been done, with the effect of smokers, smoking more, to gain the desired effect. Just great huh. How exactly do we measure harm? Should it be based merely on mortality? What about things like, social harm? Should we just neglect that? If we were honest with ourselves, we would recognize that alcohol is so much more costly that tobacco in terms of health, it makes tobacco seem like a cute puppy by comparison. Alcohol abuse is linked to several cancers. Also diabetes related to excessive sugar consumption when drinking ready mix drinks, or mixing your own. As we know full well too, alcohol is usually implicated in most homicides in NZ. Domestic violence. Unwanted/unplanned pregnancy. STD's. Vandalism. Assaults. Rape. Crime in general. Drunk driving. Robberies. Lost productivity. Alcoholism. The gate-way effect. Liver disease. Just to mention some of the 'side effects' as it were. The collateral damage. All that which we like to think, can and should be tolerated, 'because because because because because because....' The black market in NZ for tobacco, is thriving. That much is known. The idea that prohibition works, at this stage in the proceedings, is lunacy. When will we ever learn? Should we just learn to tolerate organized crime? In Australia, there is a massive black market in tobacco. That was also the case in Canada, where they raised the tobacco tax, then realized how much crime this caused, so they lowered the tax. Tobacco smuggling and the black market, is alive and well, all over Europe. You buy it cheap in one country, and take it to a place where it's expensive. Elementary, but alas, inconvenient truths. Not all at dissimilar to any policy born of denial, and delusion for that matter, hence why the last leftist Govt was 'voted' out. Just far too woke truth be known. The ASH person from the States, likened using 'vapes' to 'jumping off a building'. A little hyperbolic perhaps? Maybe fear mongering would be more apt. A somewhat ridiculous statement to be clear. Irresponsible too. I have been vaping for over 20 years. I smoked heavily prior to that. As far as I can tell, I am fit and healthy. No coughing, no wheezing, and with high nicotine, which I 'enjoy'. Obesity is a huge health problem in NZ too. You know, nicotine stifles the appetite somewhat, so when people 'quit' smoking, many of them begin to eat much more, and some become obese. I am slim, but when I gave up smoking prior to starting to vape, I gained much weight and my health 'seemed' to be worse than when I was smoking. Carrying excess weight, is like an exponential freight train on a one way track. When we add up the costs of obesity, and all the associated health problems due to that, again, if we were honest, we'd find that it costs NZ far more than tobacco related health problems by a country mile. But we won't be taxing people into poverty to impede that will we? I mean, are we allowed to dare suggest, that for some people, nicotine could be, all things considered, good for them? I dare any honest and sincere reporter, to go to any food bank, or homeless shelter, and ask the people there, if they smoke, and if they do, what impact the tax has on their capacity to live a normal life. The numbers I am certain, will reveal much about how short sighted and mean spirited society can sometimes be. Almost as though there's a regressive part of our psyche's which needs a pariah to have a go at, like the weakest puppy in the litter gets beaten by the bigger puppies. I don't like bullying of any kind, including censorship where there is no basis for it....but here we be....doing just that. There is a major mental health problem in NZ, and high numbers of people, 'checking out' if I can use a milder term without using the actual word, but at what stage, did we, as a society, lose touch with basic reason? With humanity and compassion? Is it really just due to the state of the education system in lieu of censorship whereby any such 'terms of reference' for so many issues cancels the discussion and debate, before it even began? The 'fact' is, huge numbers of acute mental health patients, smoke. They must have gravitated to tobacco because smoking alleviated their symptoms. And yet, our answer is to make those of them suffering poverty, even poorer. Even when, we know, mental health problems all too often go hand in hand, with poverty. When did we decide, consider it just, prudent and wise, to use poverty as a tool to affect good health? As we know, Maori and Pacific people are much more impacted by the 'tobacco tax', and existing poverty. Making it worse is just illogical and immoral in my view. How could we, trample on peace? Is security worth anything any more? Should dairy proprietors be subjected to all that violence? All that we have seen over the recent years, whereby, many such dairy owners, now install 'cages' between themselves and their customers, or have to check customers into the store manually once the customer has been 'profiled'? What madness. How we could just pretend that what really is important, no longer is. Tolerance and respect and peace and security. We must honor that foremost and not forget to remember, 'Lest we forget'? Maybe we did? Some of us. Surely. What exactly is worth preserving? Is fear and paranoia(crime and xenophobia and poverty), really worth embracing so we can stop people smoking, never start, or limit consumption? I mean the number one disease in the world, is poverty. And yet here we see, the 'experts' suggesting we use excessive taxation of tobacco to help people's health? Makes no sense rationally speaking. I would suggest, humbly, that we should put peace and security near the top. And anything, or any policy which erodes that, should be dealt with forthwith. For we should put 'trust' right at top. If we cannot trust one another, I would suggest that this is 'social cancer'. We need to offer people support. Not bring them down, financially or otherwise. If it is social cancer, the vaccine would have to be, open discussion and debate as opposed to unilateral narratives which are disingenuous and counter productive and harmful. How very telling too, that open debates and discussion can be memory holed so that the remedy cannot be forthcoming. For we are inadvertently or otherwise, digging ourselves into a hole with all this pedantic, ideological clap trap. The nanny state. The do-gooders. All of it. Rationale on rationale. How to argue your way out of a paper bag huh. In any event, let me be quite clear, that I do not like tobacco companies. I have helped several people now, stop smoking via the use of vapes. But if I knew someone who smoked, that is their choice. How dare I think to know better than them? How arrogant would that be? How judgemental and disrespectful. We will see if this stays up.
Wow your experts haha man that word gets thrown around a lot now ..experts As someone who has spent a lot of time overseas nobody cares, and what nz does. The combination of ignorance and arrogance is something to behold
I wish some Tobacco retailers would buck the trend, and show a little moral fibre, by refusing to stock Tobacco products. Just because you can, and it's lawful, doesn't mean it's o.k.🤔
Its crazy that I have to go to random small youtube comment sections to see well written and thoughtful arguments in relation to NZ mainstream politics. If you go onto Newshub, Stuff, HZherald comments etc, its literal braindead garbage
Unfortunately Whakaata Maori ma has no one doing a complete job on digital comms still, like filtering out racist right winger scum and other idiot commenters. Yes far worse on those other media sites - they spam all day @@mikeryan4552
