8. Question No. 8—HealthHon Dr AYESHA VERRALL (Labour) to the Associate Minister of HealthQuestion No. 8—Health8. Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL (Labour) to the Associate Minister of Health: Is it correct that annual returns submitted to the Ministry of Health show $4044956.49 worth of heated tobacco products were sold in New Zealand in 2022 and that $3924816.06 of those sales were by the tobacco company Philip Morris?Hon CASEY COSTELLO (Associate Minister of Health): No those numbers are not correct.Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall: Is it correct that the vast majority of heated tobacco products sold in New Zealand in 2022 were by the tobacco company Philip Morris?Hon CASEY COSTELLO: Yes it is.Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall: Is it correct that Philip Morris is the only company whose vaping products did not have child safety mechanisms when Cabinet took the decision to delay requirements for child safety mechanisms to be on vapes from March 2024 to October 2024?Hon CASEY COSTELLO: I don't have the information on which products didn't meet the criteria.Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall: Is it correct that her decision to halve the excise tax on heated tobacco and delay safety requirements on vapes benefit only the tobacco company Philip Morris?Hon CASEY COSTELLO: I will state clearly as we seem to be relitigating this issue and we've traversed it thoroughly that we are committed to achieving Smokefree Aotearoa 2025. I will yet again confirm that we are choosing to do a programme of work that will ensure that there are tools available to achieve the target audience quitting smoking. We will continue to do so. There is no relationship with the tobacco industry. We are committed to a programme of work and we will achieve Smokefree Aotearoa 2025—highly likely that will be achieved this year.Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall: Why won't she put as much effort into improving the health of New Zealanders as she will into helping Philip Morris?SPEAKER: Just hang on a minute. You might like to—take a seat—reword that question. It's a pretty big accusation and I think you need to back it up in some way more than just a pot-shot supplementary question. There are other ways you could ask that question.Hon Kieran McAnulty: Point of order. The way that I heard that question and it was certainly written down given that I saw it beforehand was making no accusation whatsoever. Through the previous supplementary questions it was established that the company Philip Morris benefits quite substantially from policy decisions made by this Government. On that basis flowing on from those supplementaries I'd say that that supplementary was entirely appropriate.SPEAKER: Well that's a position that you could reach; from the answers to those questions I'm sure some members of the public will do so but to stand up and make the accusation using the words why are you" and then relating it to a particular action that may or may not be the case is not reasonable. There are other ways to ask that question.Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall: Can the Minister name a single thing she has done for the health of New Zealanders that is greater than the benefits she has provided for Philip Morris?Hon CASEY COSTELLO: The Opposition seem to be fixated on tobacco companies. They seem to have lost sight of the people we are trying to help which is those who are currently smoking. They ignore the fact that the first thing I did as a Minister was raise excise tax and that we are continuing to meet with quit-smoking groups to ensure they have the best tools. The main audience for this change are the quit-smoking providers all of whom I will be meeting with over the next month to discuss the best way to continue to reduce smoking rates and achieve our smoke-free 2025 target.Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can I ask the Minister: is it a fact that this question is set in 2022 five years after the Labour Party was in Government which demonstrates that they did sweet Fanny Adams about this issue when they were in power?Hon CASEY COSTELLO: I will confirm that we are operating on advice to achieve a smoking target. The numbers that the members from across the House were quoting were unrelated to the figures as they currently are. We are at 6.8 percent smokers as at the end of 2023 and we are continuing to track down."