I can guarantee the Minister of State two things. The first is that every single TD in this Chamber has lost a friend, family member or neighbour as a direct result of smoking. The second is that every one of us also knows several people who have quit smoking with the help of vaping, friends or family members whose lives have changed. I am almost certain that almost all of them used the very flavoured vapes the Government is now proposing to ban. Banning flavoured vapes would be a complete own goal in our fight to reduce the number of smokers in Ireland. All the Government would succeed in doing is pushing people back into the grip of the tobacco industry or driving them towards unregulated online platforms where there is little to no oversight on safety, age verification or quality control. Let us look at the figures. The numbers are overwhelming. Some 73% of vapers say that fruit flavours play a key role in helping them stay off cigarettes. Some 49% would actively source flavoured vapes online or from abroad if a ban were introduced. A total of 72% believe that a ban would lead to more young people taking up smoking rather than fewer and 71% believe that banning flavours would push current vapers back towards deadly tobacco products. These are not my opinions but the views of the ordinary people whose interests we are here to represent. I have to ask whether the Minister of State and her Department even looked at what is happening in other jurisdictions that have banned flavoured vapes because it has not been a beaming success. The result has been a boom in illegal trading and an unregulated black market. This measure will not eliminate demand; it will just drive it underground. Much of this Bill is sound, a positive step and, frankly, long overdue. How it has taken so long to prohibit the use of nicotine products by under-18s is beyond me. The changes around advertising and the restrictions on the colour and styling of these products are positive and welcome steps but banning all flavours is a step too far. It is a complete overreach by this Government into the actions and decisions of consenting adults. What will be next? Are we to ban cider because it tastes of apples and might appeal to teenagers? Will we ban fruit-flavoured alcohol drinks? Tackling colour, style and marketing, as the Government is already doing, will reduce the appeal to young people. That is a sound tactic. However, we should not throw out the very tool that has helped thousands of Irish adults escape a lethal addiction. Vaping has taken us far in reducing smoking rates but that progress has stalled. The rate is no longer declining as it should. We need to be looking for the next tool to bring down that number. The cost of smoking to our health service in healthcare costs and to our society in thousands of preventable deaths is still staggering.

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