Occasionally, one comes across a law that creates more problems than it tries to solve.
The New Zealand Parliament adopted such a law on Dec. 13, the Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products (Smoked Tobacco) Amendment Act 2022.
The law stipulates that a person “must not sell a smoked tobacco product to a person born on or after 1 January 2009” or having sold a smoked tobacco product to a person of any age “must not deliver it, or arrange for it to be delivered, to a person born on or after 1 January 2009.”
The new law thus prohibits people born after Jan. 1, 2009, from ever purchasing tobacco and cigarettes during their lifetime. Its objective is to make New Zealand smoke free by 2025.
Proponents of the legislation expect that the prohibition will improve the overall health of New Zealanders and reduce the number of chronic illnesses that impose a severe financial burden on the health system.
In contrast, the centre-right National Party and the classical-liberal ACT Party opposed the law on the ground that it will impact convenience store businesses selling tobacco.
They also warned the move could facilitate or accelerate the creation of a black market.
There are indeed some bizarre consequences.
If a person was born on Dec. 31, 2008, at 11:55 p.m., that person would still be able to buy cigarettes, whereas a person born 10 minutes after would be subject to a lifetime ban (imagine the situation with twins or triplets born a few minutes apart ...).
Obviously, a line must be drawn somewhere, but an entire generation is banned from ever buying tobacco because a discretionary choice by legislators.
Creation of a Nanny State?
If tobacco is a harmful substance, then it should not matter how old a purchaser is because the product would be equally harmful to all people regardless of age.Moreover, the state, aims to protect the health of citizens, but is instead, acting as a nanny state that pretends to know what is good for them.
But people should take responsibility for their own health decisions, including whether they want to live a healthy or unhealthy life.
Every time the government seeks to impose its preferred individual economic and social choices on people, personal freedom is diminished, hence, strong justifications should be proffered for such interventions.
Also, tobacco is still a legal product, hence, the law, in prohibiting younger people from ever accessing these products, is effectively gutting a legal industry (and jobs), with impunity.
Most importantly, the prohibition mandated by the law is unlikely to work. This is because there will be plenty of opportunity for people to avoid the enforcement of the law. Those who want to smoke somehow will acquire their product, either illegally or by substituting tobacco with an equally addictive and harmful product, such as vaping.
It is certain that New Zealand is a trailblazer in the fight against tobacco use because this law is a world-first tobacco ban and is the strictest legislation in the world.
Nevertheless, it is a bad law, based on bad policy, which will be difficult to enforce. The legislation is likely to cause harm to the basic rights of different generations in New Zealand society.
Finally, the law may well prove that “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”
