Debate on "Smoking (Public Health) (Amendment) Bill 2005" (18 October 2006)

MR JAMES TIEN (in Cantonese): President, I have never smoked, be it when I was young or as a grown-up, and in my family, my wife does not smoke, nor does my son or daughter, and I am also pleased to know that my son-in-law and daughter-in-law do not smoke either. Of course, it is hardly necessary to mention my grandson, who is just one year old.

Is smoking really hazardous to health and is passive smoking equally hazardous to health? Since I do not smoke, I can only listen to the expert opinions of my friends, particularly those who are doctors. I think society has been concerned about the issue of passive smoking for a long time. I fully support the tabling of this Bill by the Government. Through taking part in the work relating to this Bill, I wanted to ensure that the position of the Liberal Party was given full recognition. It was also due to the fact that our two Honourable colleagues representing functional constituencies had to represent their industries and hence, the message they convey may not be very clear, that I took part in the scrutiny. Therefore, we fully support the enactment of this legislation by the Government and the imposition of a total ban on smoking in places frequented by members of the public, including offices, restaurants, karaoke establishments, billiard establishments, and so on, from 1 January 2007 onwards. This is an appropriate course of action. In fact, the majority of "wage earners" in Hong Kong work in offices and our 10 Members also support banning smoking in offices.

One major reason that the Liberal Party supports this Bill is that the Government will impose the mandatory ban on bars, mahjong parlours, bathhouses, message parlours and nightclubs patronized by people over 18 years of age only in another phase in July 2009, so these venues patronized by a greater number of smokers and tourists can adjust to the arrangements of the smoking ban gradually.

In addition, we also support the Government's amendment to delete the requirement that the managers of no smoking areas must display a sufficient number of no-smoking signs. The reason is very simple. Since these areas have been designated as no smoking areas by law, we think that to further require the mandatory display of so many no-smoking signs will affect the appearance of a place. For example, a smoking ban is already in effect in the Legislative Council Building, so just image: since smoking is already prohibited in the Legislative Council Building, if a heap of no smoking signs are posted on both sides of where you are seated, President, is this really necessary? I believe that it is unnecessary to do so.

President, after almost two years of debate on the Bill, the scope of the smoking ban has been expanded significantly. Apart from our initial idea or understanding that the Government proposed to ban smoking completely in indoor places, the outdoor places covered by Schedule 2 have also increased significantly and they include hospitals, the outdoor areas of educational institutions, escalators, public pleasure grounds, beaches, public swimming pools, stadia and the so-called communal quarters.

Of course, enlarging the scope of the smoking ban is definitely desirable to non-smoker members of the public like me, since their health can be even better protected and the situation of puffs of second-hand smoke wafting over, making one feel uncomfortable, can be pre-empted. Therefore, the Liberal Party supports extending the no smoking area to most of the places listed in Schedule 2, in particular, to hospitals and schools frequented by elderly persons and young people.

President, I wish to talk about the issue of school uniform raised by Mr Andrew CHENG here. In December 2004, a group called Committee on Youth Smoking Prevention (Hong Kong) organized a signature campaign. At that time, I also signed in support and called on Mr Howard YOUNG and Mrs Sophie LEUNG to sign as well, since the campaign called for the prohibition of the sale of tobacco products to people wearing school uniforms. Perhaps due to the fact that I do not smoke, I did not have a deep understanding of this issue. On hearing about people wearing school uniforms, the first thing that came to my mind was students in their teens in primary and secondary schools. It did not occur to me that even people in their twenties can also wear school uniforms and even people in their forties and fifties attending extramural programmes can also wear school uniforms. If the sale of tobacco products to anyone wearing a school uniform is prohibited, will that be feasible? Of course, some vendors selling cigarettes said that if these people put raincoats over their school uniforms to cover them, it would be difficult to tell if they are students. Therefore, on this issue, I believe the most important thing is that this concept of school uniforms is in fact the concept of young people, that is, the concept of people being under 18 years of age. At present, since the law already prohibits the sale of tobacco products to young people under 18 years of age, I believe this is actually a fair approach in dealing with this matter. Conversely, if it is stipulated that young people over 18 years of age wearing school uniforms cannot buy cigarettes, it is not even necessary for them to go home to get changed at all. They only have to turn round, take off their ties and jackets and buy some cigarettes. They can then simply put their ties on again and that is it. In these circumstances, is it possible to implement the measure prohibiting the sale of cigarettes to them?

President, we also have some other views concerning Schedule 2. We understand that at present, tobacco products are not classified as contrabands in Hong Kong, that is, they are not treated as illicit drugs. I believe we should leave a little room for smokers, who are the minority, while catering to the health of the public and the rights of a small number of smokers. I do not use words such as "striking a balance" because the two sides cannot be balanced and it can even be said that the balance is tilted entirely in favour of one side, so all we hope is that a little room can be given back to smokers.

Therefore, the Liberal Party welcomes the government proposal to designate a small area in pleasure grounds such as parks. Of course, the Government's claim is that it is easier to designate 1% of the area in larger parks but it is very difficult to do so in smaller ones, however, we think that the Government should let the departments concerned designate this so-called "small area", which should be as small but also as practicable as possible. This will give the minority smokers and elderly people who often relax in parks and who are addicted to smoking some places to smoke. I think this is a reasonable and sensible approach. In this connection, we in the Liberal Party were not quite sure what should be done either, so we conducted a public opinion survey on whether a small area should be designated as a smoking area in parks. The results show that opinions are equally divided, with 48% of the people surveyed supporting the idea and 43% opposed to it. In fact, public opinion on this issue is equally divided.

Another issue that the Liberal Party opposes is the Government's claim that it is also necessary to ban smoking on beaches. We think that beaches are open areas and even if some individuals smoke, I believe the impact will not be great. We have also looked into the situation in overseas countries. According to the information provided by the Government, at present, all over the world, smoking is prohibited only on several beaches in Queensland and in Sydney, Australia. We have also looked at the other side of the coin. For example, I often go cruising in France and at such places as Saint Tropez, Nice and Cannes in southern France, Malaga in Spain and Sardinia in Italy, smoking is not prohibited on beaches. Take the Waikiki Beach in Hawaii and the beaches in California as other examples, smoking is not prohibited in those places either. Therefore, I believe that if throughout the world, only a few examples of banning smoking on beaches can be found in Australia, and if we in Hong Kong want to follow these examples by banning smoking on beaches, is it really necessary? What will be the actual effects? A puff of smoke will be blown away by wind in a wink.

President, another point on which we and representatives of the business sector and employers have some views is the ban on smoking in communal quarters. The present Bill proposed by the Government provides that smoking be banned in the communal quarters provided by employers to employees. That is to say, if I, as an employer, provides two identical units to employees as quarters, if one of them is taken up by a family of four consisting of a couple and their two children, even if the quarters are provided by an employer, it is not necessary to ban smoking there. If another unit is provided to two or three male or female employees living together, then it is necessary to ban smoking. As another example, if several of my employees rent a unit to live together, smoking does not have to be banned there and it only has to be banned in the quarters provided by employers. Is this really logical?

Another situation where enforcement I believe will also be difficult is the ban on smoking on escalators such as the escalators in Central. In theory, everything sounds fine. It has a cover but its sides are open, moreover, there are stairs on one side. People who use the stairs can smoke but they cannot do so on the escalators. However, in the spaces between escalators ─ let me see how I should put it ─ on the landing platforms, that is, on those small pieces of level ground, smoking is allowed. Who will actually be responsible for law enforcement? How much manpower must the Government recruit in order to achieve its goal? President, the Liberal Party concludes that we very much support a piece of anti-smoking legislation that is reasonable and enforceable.

However, we are gravely concerned that although a piece of legislation is passed, it will be difficult to enforce. I am not saying that a law is not enforced but that if it is not possible to enforce it, gradually it will not have much effect. Finally, the Liberal Party eagerly hopes that the number of smokers in Hong Kong will decrease after the passage of the Bill. I think that apart from enacting legislation, one thing that the Government has promised to do and which we also support as an ongoing effort is education and publicity. In particular, we would learn from the television and newspapers occasionally that the problem of smoking among a lot of young people, in particular, among young women, is deteriorating, so can it be solved merely by enacting legislation? I believe not, so I hope the Government can continue to do something in other areas.

As regards the voting that will take place later, the Liberal Party thinks that some provisions are not reasonable and we have always opposed them. However, the provision on banning smoking on beaches, in communal quarters and on escalators are set down in Schedule 2 among a group of more than 20 items and together with places where we believe smoking should be banned, such as public swimming pools, wetland parks and stadia, therefore, it is not possible to vote on them separately. In view of this, when voting on the entire Bill, the Liberal Party has no choice but to accept reluctantly and ─ the Government will be happy to hear this ─ vote in support of the Government on everything. Thank you, President.