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| Special issue 132 | 16 December 2009 | ||||||||||||
Having trouble viewing this newsletter? Try the online version. Māori Select Committee Inquiry Report |
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Professor Robert Beaglehole (left), Chair of the Smokefree Coalition, chaired the Auckland seminar hosted by Te Hotu Manawa Māori on Thursday 10 December. Pictured with Robert (left to right) are Moana Tane, Chair of Te Hotu Manawa Māori, Prudence Stone, Director of the Smokefree Coalition, and Shane Kawenata Bradbrook, Director of Te Reo Marama. |
Submissions from the public are now being invited on the inquiry which will look closely at how the tobacco industry has promoted tobacco use among Māori and the consequences tobacco use has had for Māori.
Smokefree Coalition Director Prudence Stone wants New Zealanders, and particularly Māori, to make submissions telling the Select Committee of the devastating effects of tobacco use.
"For decades tobacco companies have literally gotten away with murder. They have deliberately marketed their killer product to minorities and indigenous populations and then paid expensive lawyers to exploit legal loopholes and evade responsibility," Ms Stone says.
"This is an industry that causes the deaths of about 600 Māori and 5000 New Zealanders every year. We now have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to call them to account, and this time they will have nowhere to hide."
The terms of reference for the inquiry include examining the impact tobacco use has had on the health, economic, social and cultural wellbeing of Māori, as well as on Māori development aspirations and opportunities.
Te Reo Marama Director Shane Kawanata Bradbrook says the inquiry offers Māori the opportunity to meet future developmental aspirations that are currently being impeded by tobacco use, and that personal stories from smokers and their families will help represent to the Committee the sickness and misery that is the reality of smoking.
"It is crucial that this Committee is provided with a clear and unequivocal picture of the harm tobacco use causes and that New Zealanders, even those who smoke, resent the way tobacco companies have profited from their slick marketing of addiction and death."
Te Hotu Manawa Māori Executive Director Moana Tane agreed that this was the perfect opportunity to show the Committee first hand how Māori aspirations of whānau ora continue to be compromised by an unbridled and greedy tobacco industry.
"Every day in our work with Māori communities on marae around the country, we are confronted with the names and faces of whānau who have passed away prematurely, through smoking-related diseases.
"Of particular concern to Te Hotu Manawa Māori are the lung cancer rates for Māori women that are jaw-dropping by international standards. As whānau we want to move forward but the reality is we have big business working silently, anonymously and unfettered, to keep us smoking."
The Smokefree Coalition, Te Reo Marama and Te Hotu Manawa Māori have organised seminars to assist health workers and members of the public in making submissions. Seminars will be held in Auckland on 10 December and in Wellington on 14 December. Information about attending and an inquiry submission tool kit can be found on the Smokefree Coalition and Te Reo Marama websites.
Submissions to the Māori Affairs Select Committee can be written, oral or made online.
Submissions close on 29 January 2010.
Select Committee tobacco inquiry a truly historic event
Smokefree Coalition media release
9 December 2009
A seminar was held in Auckland on 10 December to help smokefree organisations make submissions to a government inquiry into the tobacco industry's impact on Māori.
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At the seminars Shane Kawenata Bradbrook opened the Toolkit for attendees, calling for all submissions to demand tobacco industry leaders in New Zealand be held accountable for the deaths of 5000 kiwis each year. View the Inquiry Toolkit and seminar presentation prepared by Te Reo Marama. |
The Māori Affairs Select Committee will be undertaking the inquiry, which, the Smokefree Coalition says, may go down in history as one of this century's most important events for Māori health in New Zealand.
Smokefree Coalition Director Prudence Stone said opportunities like this come once in a lifetime.
"We're talking abut an industry that has deliberately made its products more highly addictive, and lied to consumers over and over again. It causes the deaths of 600 Māori and 5000 New Zealanders every year.
"This is a rare chance to pin that industry down and make it answer some very specific questions about the way it has targeted Māori in its marketing, and to ask it to account for the misery its addictive wares have caused.
"I think in future we'll look back on this inquiry as having been a truly historic event, ushering in the sunset years for the tobacco industry in New Zealand."
Ms Stone says a key aspect of the inquiry will be personal stories from past smokers, to explain to the Select Committee how they were duped into smoking by misleading advertising, and about the harms to their health and aspirations that have resulted from their addiction.
Those attending the seminar were presented with a toolkit containing guidelines and resources to help focus their submissions to the inquiry. Various experts spoke about the importance of the inquiry and how a tobacco-free New Zealand could be achieved by 2020.
"I'm here because this is a matter of life and death," said Shane Kawenata Bradbrook of Te Reo Marama, which co-hosted the event.
"If banning smoking right now isn't a realistic option, then a timeline for doing so within ten years seems a viable second best option. Making submissions to the inquiry will be an excellent start, and we want to encourage as many people to make submissions as possible."
"By 2020" recommends Smokefree Coalition
Smokefree Coalition media release
12 December 2009
The Smokefree Coalition held its second seminar on the Māori Affairs Select Committee Inquiry into the tobacco industry and the consequences of tobacco use for Māori in Wellington on 14 December. New director Dr Prudence Stone presented the Coalition's Vision for a tobacco-free New Zealand by 2020 to the seminar attendees.
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Ben Youdan, Director of ASH New Zealand, told attendees to framework their recommendations toward an 'endgame solution' for tobacco in New Zealand, incorporating many measures all equally important to eliminating supply and demand. Ben Youdan and Michael Colhoun's presentation gave key recommendations on making submissions. |
"With our background research and recommendations, we know New Zealand can be smokefree by 2020," Stone said.
"We must now hand that confidence over to the Select Committee, so that they share that confidence, when they hand those recommendations on to government."
The seminar was held to help Coalition members make submissions to the Inquiry on the tobacco industry and the consequences of tobacco use for Māori. The Coalition's members include the Quit Group, the Asthma Foundation, ASH, Cancer Society and the New Zealand Drug Foundation.
Te Reo Marama Director Shane Bradbrook presented a submissions Toolkit, saying opportunities like this, where the industry will be pinned down and unable to hide behind clever lawyers, come once in a lifetime.
"We're talking about an industry that deliberately makes its products more addictive, lies to consumers and specifically targets indigenous peoples. It causes the deaths of 5000 New Zealanders every year, 600 of whom are Māori.
"The inquiry is a watershed event where tobacco companies will have to answer some very specific questions about their marketing and account for the misery their addictive wares have caused.
"I think in future we'll look back on this Inquiry as having been the beginning of the end for the tobacco industry in New Zealand."
The Quit Group's Director Paula Snowden told members to find the smokers and ex-smokers willing to tell the Inquiry their personal stories about how misleading advertising helped them become addicted, and about the harms to themselves and their whānau that resulted.
Otago School of Medicine experts reinforced the Smokefree Coalition's Vision for 2020, showing how a tobacco-free New Zealand could be achieved by 2020 through government legislation addressing supply and demand, and tobacco's marketing and promotion.
Professor Tony Blakely said ethnic inequalities in life expectancy between Māori and non-Māori could be eliminated by 2040 if long-run trends continue, and that eliminating tobacco from New Zealand by 2020 will be one essential step towards this 2040 goal."The Good News this Christmas should be that New Zealand can!" said Stone. "Every submission made to the Māori Affairs Select Committee should recommend that it does!"
A toast to ghosts of Christmas Past
Asthma Foundation media release
12 December 2009
The Chief Executive of the Asthma Foundation, who will chair a special Smokefree Coalition seminar in Wellington on Monday, will be raising her glass and asking attendees to make a toast.
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Moana Tane, Director of Te Hotu Manawa Māori, spoke of taking a leadership role, inspiring others to take part in this inquiry. Click here for Moana Tane's presentation. Moana also presented a letter from Tariana Turia encouraging everyone to make submissions to the inquiry. See also: Māori and tobacco – Experience of use and responses. |
"To absent friends and family," Jane Patterson will say, referring to the 5000 deaths in New Zealand each year that are attributable to tobacco use. Up to 600 of those deaths are Māori, according to the Ministry of Health.
Parliament's Māori Affairs Select Committee has pointed a finger at the tobacco industry, hoping to gain a comprehensive understanding of its actions to promote tobacco use in New Zealand. Submissions on an enquiry by the Select Committee into the tobacco industry and the consequences of tobacco use among Māori close on 29 January, 2010.
The Smokefree Coalition is holding the seminar to make sure all its members contribute to the Select Committee submissions process, says Smokefree Coalition Director, Dr Prudence Stone.
Smokefree Coalition members include the National Heart Foundation, the New Zealand Dentist's Association, the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and the New Zealand Medical Association, all of which sent delegates to a seminar held in Auckland last week and will send them to Wellington tomorrow.
While the mood is hopeful that the inquiry will be a watershed for the tobacco control community, Jane will remind attendees of the real reason that they have been called together.
"We are all touched – Māori in particular – by the grief and loss of loved ones, caused by this addictive product," Jane says.
"The time has come for us to tell the Government we don't want it anymore. It's time New Zealand stood up to big tobacco and pushed it off our shores."
University of Otago presentations
- Richard Edwards
Applying the Vision and the Toolkit: The importance of framing - George Thomson
Tobacco endgames for Aotearoa: How the $5 cigarette will add 4 years of life for Māori - Richard Edwards et al
Majority support by Māori and non-Māori smokers for many aspects of increased tobacco control regulation: national survey data
New Zealand Medical Journal, December 2009, Vol 122 No 1307
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Attendees to the Auckland seminar from Māori SIDS Ngaire Pera, Nicola McDonald and Herena Te Wano. Feeling confident after attending, these women sang us all a waiata as farewell. |
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