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Following is a question by Dr Hon Lo Wing-lok and a reply by the Secretary for Health & Welfare, Dr E K Yeoh, in the Legislative Council today (May 16):

Question:

Will the Government inform this Council whether it will consider regulating the promotion of tobacco products by tobacco companies through the following channels: Internet, TV plots, film segments and television broadcast of sports competitions held in overseas venues which display tobacco advertisements; if it will not, of the reasons for that?

Answer:

By the existing Smoking (Public Health) Ordinance, we can regulate the promotion of tobacco products by tobacco companies, including the display of tobacco advertisements. Hong Kong has been following closely the international trend in tobacco control, with tobacco advertisements being prohibited in most of the public places. In the legislative amendments of the Ordinance we proposed on Monday, one of the proposals was to impose more stringent controls on tobacco advertisements.

Under the existing Ordinance, there are provisions governing tobacco advertising through each of the following channels: television, film and the Internet. Section 13 of the Ordinance prohibits the broadcast of tobacco advertisement by radio or visual images. Section 13A prohibits the exhibition of tobacco advertisement by film. Also, in Section 13B, it prohibits the placing of tobacco advertisements on the Internet. Any person who contravenes these sections commits an offence and is liable to a maximum fine of $25,000. Thus, it is obvious that the existing legislation does have clear provisions for the regulation of tobacco advertising through these channels.

Although there are tobacco products appearing occasionally on television, they are not for the purpose of advertising. In order to deal with this situation, Section 14(5) of the Ordinance allows accidental or incidental appearance of tobacco product or the trade mark, trade name, brand name or logo of tobacco product. Since their appearances require that no valuable consideration has been or is intended to be given, the promotion of tobacco products by tobacco companies through these channels can still be effectively prohibited. Therefore, most of their appearances are necessary for the TV plots or as accompaniments to the broadcasting of competitions. For the broadcasts of sports competitions held in overseas venues which display tobacco advertisements, there exists practical enforcement problems if they are to be regulated.

Legislation is of course one of the important means for the regulation of the promotion of tobacco products by tobacco companies. However, it does have limitations. In the above-mentioned situations, legislation may not be the most feasible solution for the problem. The reason is that in most cases, the tobacco shots are considered necessary by the producers of the TV programs or films. If we prohibit the appearance of any smoking act in TV or film, or any broadcasts of sports competitions which venues have tobacco advertisements, we have to consider carefully its reasonableness and feasibility. According to what we know, there are no overseas countries banning these situations by legislation. This in fact implies that apart from legislation, we should also consider tackling the problem by other means.

Over the years, the Government has adopted the multi-pronged approach for its anti-smoking policy, which includes legislation, education and publicity. Thus, apart from legislation, tobacco advertisements can also be regulated by other means. An example is through an ongoing dialogue between the Tobacco Control Office (TCO) under the Department of Health, and other anti-smoking bodies such as the Council on Smoking and Health (COSH), with the producers of the TV programs or films, persuading them to avoid the unnecessary smoking act during production. Another means is the pressure exerted by the non-smoking public. The experiences of overseas countries show that effective education and publicity are the most important for this issue. They should be coordinated with a view to arousing the awareness of the general public on the harmful effects of smoking and to cultivating a no-smoking culture.

End/Wednesday, May 16, 2001

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