NBers deserve voice in deciding the future of tobacco industry

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Within the next few months, Premier Blaine Higgs will likely be asked to make a decision that will affect the health of New Brunswickers for decades. Canada’s largest tobacco companies are expected to offer the province a greater share of their future sales revenues to settle the province’s long-standing lawsuit against them. A thumbs up by Premier Higgs to this deal would keep these deadly products on the market indefinitely and position them favourably as tobacco manufacturers continue marketing their newer nicotine products that are addicting youth at an alarming rate across Canada.

On the other hand, a rejection of this offer could force the companies to wind down their operations in Canada.

The premier has had years to prepare for this decision. The provinces’ Department of Justice has been involved in this case since early 2019 when the companies first asked for insolvency protection and closed-door negotiations to settle all the lawsuits they faced in Canada.

Continued delays in the negotiations recently prompted an Ontario judge to direct a mediator to prepare a draft settlement. Because this will be done under the framework of insolvency law, this proposal will almost certainly aim to return the companies to profitability while providing payments to New Brunswick and the many other creditors. Because the companies have relatively little savings, such payments will largely be deferred and will depend on future sales.

Fifteen years have passed since the government of New Brunswick initiated its lawsuit against tobacco companies. Yet in all of that time, and through all of the changes in leadership, not once has the government sought the views of New Brunswickers on how to ensure that the lawsuit results in better protection for kids, better health for communities, or reduced burden on the health care system.

The tobacco industry did not respond to the lawsuits by altering their business practices and it did not stop them from recruiting children to smoking. Many of the province’s 81,100 smokers were recruited by this industry after the province filed this lawsuit.

An agreement by New Brunswick’s government to keep tobacco companies alive just so they can make future payments will make things worse. It would give tacit approval to the lethal business practices that the government once sought to censure. It would perpetuate the harm to citizens for which the province once sought redress. It would cause economic harm to those whose health has been harmed by addiction because it would use their purchases to finance payments to government.

Polling suggests that the majority of Canadians understand that a primarily monetary settlement is not the best outcome for these lawsuits. A recent survey by Leger found a high level of support for an outcome that would phase out commercial tobacco sales (74  per cent among Atlantic Canadians). When asked which they would prefer if government had to choose between a phase-out and a cash settlement, twice as many Canadians felt it more important for lawsuits to be used to phase-out commercial sales of tobacco.

Premier Higgs is missing this picture if he does not recognize that his response to an offer from the companies is a major public policy decision – one which deserves meaningful input from the public and transparency about the consequences on his part.

Knowing that a draft settlement is in development, Premier Higgs should move quickly to initiate such consultations and to be open about the choices before him. The confidentiality of the negotiations does not prevent government from providing the public with its own analysis of the situation. It does not stop the legislature from holding public hearings on the future of tobacco nor preclude the Minister of Health from hosting meetings with community leaders and experts. It does not block the province from discussing ways to wind down the commercial sale of tobacco or designing interim supply systems which could help New Brunswick’s communities become nicotine-free.

Premier Higgs must soon decide whether to allow the tobacco industry to survive or whether to allow it to be buried by its debts. But it’s not too late for him to ask New Brunswickers which future they want.

Cynthia Callard, Physicians for a Smoke-free Canada; Flory Doucas, Quebec Coalition for Tobacco Control; Les Hagen, Action on Smoking and Health (Canada)