By Corey Connelly Thursday, October 22 2009

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Corrine Baptiste-Mc Knight...

INDEPENDENT Senator Corrine Baptiste-Mc Knight believes that the Government’s proposed Tobacco Control Bill seeks to punish people who enjoy smoking.

She made the point on Tuesday while contributing to debate on the controversial legislation in the Upper House. Essentially, the bill seeks to ban smoking in closed public spaces such as workplaces, clubs, bars, and restaurants. Persons found guilty of violating the ban would be subjected to stiff fines of $10,000 or six months imprisonment.

Baptiste-Mc Knight said while she understood the premise upon which the bill was based — to address the health and social consequences of tobacco use on citizens — the Government should not attempt to achieve its desired objectives through draconian measures.

“We cannot accomplish this by blatantly disenfranchising most smokers. The bill seeks to punish people who enjoy smoking,” she said. Baptiste-Mc Knight elicited laughter from members of the Upper House when she said that people who smoke “have their own punishment built in.” “They have already told us they get emphysema, they get heart attacks, they get all sorts of things. And let me tell you how they pay for it,” she said. Between 2004 and 2007, Baptiste-Mc Knight said WITCO paid $225,940,000 million in taxes “From the bad habits.”

She said if the Government seriously wanted to reduce the burden of cigarette use they should pump money into cancer research or some other health programme. “But much as I would like to accept this bit of legislation as it comes I can’t because draconian measures of this sought do not prove that we are ready to be first world. The fact that we can pass legislation that is harsher than other legislation in the first world does not prove that we are ready.

“What proves we are ready is the extent to which we can get our citizens to comply with the legislation,” she said.