Public Health (Single-Use Vapes) Bill 2025: Second Stage
Seanad Éireann — 2026-04-28
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Michael McDowell (IND), National University of Ireland

I welcome the Minister of State. Clearly this is a complex issue. It is complicated by European law and by the points that have just been made about adults, children and the like. It is complicated by the concept that, while tobacco consumption as a way of getting nicotine is manifestly worse for health than vaping is, nobody knows really what the long-term consequences of vaping actually are.
As a general point, there is confusion in this society on the part of those people who want to legalise cannabis on the one hand and, at the same time, wipe out tobacco consumption. There is a very strong correlation between consumption of tobacco and of cannabis. When I was Minister for justice, I had to wrestle with the problem. People asked me why, since I was a liberal, I did not allow people smoke cannabis. It is for the very simple reason that if it is legalised, an 18-year-old can get it and give it to a 14-year-old. The qualities of cannabis, the psychological and psychiatric effects, are very serious.
The Minister of State is proposing to bring in further legislation on this matter. I know this is highly qualified, and very unusually qualified, by the European dimension, which is strange indeed. The Italian Government has complained about Ireland to the Commission so we are on thin enough ice, or a tightrope, before we start.
I would just like to point out a few things about the Public Health (Tobacco Products and Nicotine Inhaling Products) (Amendment ) Bill 2026, particularly in page 23, subsection (7), which deals with licensees' obligations. Section 26A(7) provides that:
"This section shall not apply to a premises or a website (or otherwise online) which wholly comprises the sale of nicotine inhaling products or mainly comprises the sale of nicotine inhaling products, provided that the only other products sold at that premises or from that website (or otherwise online) are—
(a) nicotine consumption products,
(b) vapes,
(c) vaping substances, or
(d) accessories related to the functioning or maintenance of nicotine inhaling products or vapes."."
What are we doing here? We are saying that the prohibition on advertising, provided for in subsection (2) of the same section 26A, through circulars, leaflets, pamphlets and brochures does not apply to somebody who specialises in the sale of vaping products. I can see what it says but I do not know what the logic behind it is. There is a shop at the top of upper Merrion Street, which seems to be a vape shop alone. I am always struck by the fact that they can pay a rent and carry on a business right in the city centre, apparently in circumstances where they could avail of section 26A(7). I really wonder if we actually want to say that the ban on advertising leaflets and the like does not apply to websites exclusively dealing with vaping products. We will have to look at that on Committee Stage. There is another point I want to make in my limited time. Section 28B deals with supply. It provides that: "A person shall not sell by retail, or cause to be sold by retail, a nicotine consumption product to a child." It does not stop a 17-year-old or an 18-and-a-half-year-old from going in and buying the half the shop and giving it to 15-year-olds directly outside the premises. Is that okay? Is it okay for a 15-year-old to ask an 18-and-a-half-year-old to go and buy a month's supply of vaping products? We really have to think this through.
The Minister of State is in the embarrassing position, if I may say that, of having two Bills in the pipeline, of which this is one. I really do think we have to look around a few corners and ask ourselves whether this Bill is in a fit condition to be passed in its present form, even if something else more serious is coming down the tracks. I will leave it at that.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-04-28/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:52+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-04-28