Honourable senators, I am pleased to rise today to speak to the message on Bill S-5 which proposes to require plain packaging of tobacco products and to regulate vaping.

On the latter point, the government’s aim is to strike the balance between the possibility for harm reduction and addiction cessation while also preventing the creation of new nicotine dependency in the population.

I want to thank all my honourable colleagues, as well as our colleagues at the other place, for their work on this bill that was introduced in this chamber on November 22, 2016. I would especially like to thank Senator Petitclerc, the sponsor of the bill, and Senators Seidman and Cordy for their work as critics, as well as Senators Dean, Eggleton and others who proposed important amendments to this bill.

Through the amendments introduced both by the Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology and in the other place I believe we have demonstrated the positive role the Senate can have in contributing to stronger legislation that advances the health and well-being of Canadians.

I know we all recognize that smoking is a national public health problem. Every year, 45,000 Canadians die from a smoking-related disease and the harms of tobacco use have left a profound impact on many more. These harms are completely preventable and the number of Canadians who continue to suffer from consequences of smoking is unacceptable.

Bill S-5 provides and an important and necessary legislative response to the tobacco epidemic. It provides further foundation for plain and standardized packaging of tobacco products which will further prevent youth and non-smokers from being enticed to try tobacco products in the first place.

Bill S-5 will also provide adults the legal access to better-regulated vaping products. These products can serve as a less harmful alternative to cigarettes and can be a much-needed option for those who have been unable to quit smoking.

Notable changes have been made to the bill by the other place since it was passed here. In addition to some technical amendments, such as aligning different statutes, the other place also approved amendments to Bill S-5 in response to newly emerging scientific evidence and additional feedback from stakeholders.

An important concern raised by witnesses and various stakeholders before the Standing Committee on Health in the other place was that the promotional restrictions on vaping products needed to be strengthened to protect youth and non-users of tobacco products from inducements to use vaping products.

I know some senators originally shared this view in the Senate proceedings. Specifically in the other place there was a concern that Bill S-5 would permit the vaping industry to use lifestyle advertising to promote vaping to youth and non-smokers. Since the bill was introduced in 2016, numerous population and public health studies have emerged that strengthen the link between youth exposure to vaping product advertisements and inducements to use these products.

A sample of the study findings from this year alone include one of the first longitudinal cohort studies which was published in the Journal for Addictive Behaviour, entitled “E-cigarette advertising exposure in e-cigarette naïve adolescents and subsequent e-cigarette use: A longitudinal cohort study.” The researchers for this study concluded that:

. . . exposure to e-cigarette advertising on social networking sites among youth who had never used e-cigarettes increases the likelihood of subsequent e-cigarette use.

Another study from 2017 in the journal Pediatrics, entitled “Receptivity to Tobacco Advertising and Susceptibility to Tobacco Products,” found that youth ages 12 to 13 had a higher receptiveness to e-cigarettes advertising over tobacco. The study concluded that:

Receptivity to advertising for each non-cigarette tobacco product was associated with susceptibility to smoke cigarettes.

Emerging information also indicates that adult non-smokers’ attitudes and behaviour may also be affected when exposed to lifestyle advertising about vaping.

Given this research and the government’s intention to make decisions based on the best evidence available, an amendment was introduced to remove the exceptions that allowed lifestyle advertising for vaping products.

The challenge is to reduce the harms caused by cigarette smoking for those unable to quit and to protect youth and non-smoking Canadians from the harm of vaping products. Because, make no mistake, these products may be less harmful than cigarettes but they are not harmless.

Bill S-5 is an important element of this government’s anti-tobacco strategy. It is a necessary tool for combating one of the toughest public health problems our society has had to address.

Passing Bill S-5 is also critical to implementing plain and standardized packaging measures for tobacco products in Canada which will reduce the appeal of tobacco packages and the deadly products they contain.

The social and economic costs of tobacco use affect us all. The latest estimate places the total direct and indirect costs at $16.2 billion a year. Think of the positive health outcomes if all 3.9 million Canadians who currently smoke were to switch completely to vaping. They would significantly reduce their exposure to many of the harmful chemicals found in cigarette smoke.

I believe Bill S-5 is an important piece of legislation that provides a tough legislative response to the tobacco epidemic.

Honourable senators, I hope you share this view. I know that Senator Petitclerc will provide a much more detailed and certainly more eloquent explanation of the content of the message.

For the moment, I thank senators for their attention on this matter and encourage you to join me in supporting this motion to concur in the message from the other place as there is no time for harm reduction like the present.

Thank you.

The Hon. the Speaker: Senator Joyal would like to ask a question, Senator Harder.

Hon. Serge Joyal: Are you ready to transpose all your comments to the smoking of cannabis for youth?

Senator Harder: I thank the senator for his question and for the interest amongst senators on the subject. As all senators will know, this subject is presently being debated in committee.

I would like to do a comparison as to the restrictions on advertising for both Bill C-45 and Bill S-5 and suggest that they are largely the same, including nothing that is appealing to youth, no sponsorship or testimonials, and mandatory health warnings.

With respect to Bill C-45 specifically, it will establish many of the same advertising restrictions that exist for tobacco products, which would prevent youth from being persuaded to use cannabis products.

Regarding packaging, all cannabis products will be a single uniform colour and tamper evident, while the use of graphics and images will be prohibited. Additionally, labels will need to include mandatory health warnings, a standardized cannabis sign, and information such as “THC and CBD content.”

An amendment made to clause 36 of Bill S-5 bans the lifestyle promotion surrounding portrayals of glamour, recreation, excitement, fatality, risk or daring. Bill C-45 also has the same bans.

Clause 32 of Bill S-5 prohibits the promotion of a device that has the shape, appearance or sensory attribute or function that could be appealing to a young person. This is also in the cannabis legislation.

Senator Joyal: Is the honourable senator aware that rock stars already have identified themselves as being mentors for a brand and that there are lifestyle or social events organized — I think there was one in Toronto recently, not last weekend — to promote some brand as being the one that Canadians should be invited to use?

So in fact, there is already in the Canadian society ways to try to circumvent the prohibition that seems to be the one that the government supports in Bill S-5.

Senator Harder: I’m not as well acquainted with rock stars as the honourable senator, but let me simply say that the passage of the bill before us would provide a legislative framework around which I have just described.

Senator Joyal: I don’t look like a rock star at all; I’m probably the dullest clothed senator in this chamber.

However, the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee recommended in its report last Tuesday that the government should be very much concerned with the advertising and the initiative that companies can take to try and promote the use of marijuana. That’s the concern we have. I don’t think many senators in this room would disagree with the comments you made in relation to Bill S-5. But doubt remains that in relation to the consumption of cannabis, the proposed regulations that were published three weeks ago by the Minister of Health are stringent enough to prevent the kind of initiative that I just referred to from being barred or, in my opinion, from possibly preventing the spread of smoking cannabis as being a way to live a contemporary life.

It’s not to put on the rock star or the promotion or the capacity to smoke, for instance, at jazz festivals or at social gatherings where the crowd is mainly youth or people who are close to the age of 18.

Senator Harder: I thank the senator for his comments. Let me simply say that from the government’s perspective, these are matters now before the Social Affairs Committee. I look forward to participating in the debate when the recommendations of the Social Affairs Committee come to the floor, where this issue and other issues can be debated more fully.

I want to thank the honourable senator for his support for the amendments as I described for Bill S-5.

Hon. Yonah Martin (Deputy Leader of the Opposition): I have a question for Senator Harder. It’s hard not to talk about Bill C-45 as we look at Bill S-5 in the message from the House of Commons. In terms of plain packaging of tobacco, I know why we are doing it. At the same time, the contraband market continues to be a growing problem. I was wondering, senator, if you might be able to talk about the lessons learned and what the government is planning to prevent the contraband market if and when marijuana is legalized.

Senator Harder: I thank the honourable senator for her question, which is largely with respect to Bill C-45.

Clearly, the government and law enforcement have learned a good deal from the contraband market in tobacco. It is certainly the government’s view that the plain packaging provided for in this legislation and the best health approach, and that health approach is what has evidenced itself in the work of this chamber and the other chamber.

It is the government’s view that the implementation of Bill C-45 and the gradual retreat from the black market of contraband and illegal product is in the health interests of Canadians. It’s the health approach that we’re taking on Bill C-45, and as we are engaged in that, I’m sure the enforcement officials will want to ensure that we are using the best lessons learned from the illegal market in contraband tobacco.

Senator Martin: There’s evidence from other jurisdictions like Australia that plain packaging hasn’t tackled the contraband issue. In fact, it had the opposite effect. It’s hard to discern from a distance with plain packaging what is “real” and what is “fake.” These are concerns with marijuana and how that will be addressed.