COSATU backs tighter tobacco control legislation but wants more to be done to stamp out illicit trade

CAPE TOWN - Trade union federation COSATU says while it’s in broad support of tighter tobacco control legislation, more needs to be done to clamp down on the illicit trade. 

While the industry is concerned about the job losses that could result from more stringent legislation, COSATU believes it’s the illicit trade that could fuel unemployment.

Parliament's health committee is currently considering public input on a new bill that will for the first time, also regulate vaping and other electronic forms of smoking.

COSATU says the Tobacco Products and Electronic Delivery Systems Control Bill is a progressive response to a national health crisis. 

The union’s parliamentary representative, Matthew Parks, said that workplace productivity was being impacted by the effects of smoking.

But he’s calling on legislators to be bolder and to consider including track and identification mechanisms in the bill to stamp out the sale of illegal cigarettes. 

"We have a real problem of the explosion of illicit trade in tobacco, and that threatens health objectives, it threatens lives, but also threatens the legal-binding industry and, of course, those jobs and value chains there."

Parks said the workforce was also being impacted by premature deaths as a result of the effects of smoking.

"We support the provisions which seek at a workplace to reduce the amount of smoking and exposure of smoke to non-smoking workers."

COSATU has pleaded with Parliament to pass the new legislation before the end of the seventh administration.