SA Health to continue sending underaged teens in to try to buy smokes

Miles Kemp
adelaidenow
October 17, 2012

THE Health Department will continue to pay children as young as 14 to act as bait to entrap businesses selling cigarettes to minors.

Its decision will overrule the safety concerns of the Employee Ombudsman.

Children could be victimised by unscrupulous business people who they had caught breaking the law, an investigation by Employee Ombudsman Stephen Brennan has found.

He said they could also be traumatised by having to appear as witnesses against businesses in court cases.

“The basis of our concern is the fundamental position that we consider it unnecessary to use minors in any form of law enforcement,” Mr Brennan said.

“We just don’t see the merit and I think society and the community generally wouldn’t like the use of children to become an acceptable tool in law enforcement.”

But Health Minister John Hill told The Advertiser yesterday the dangers posed to the minors employed by SA Health had to be weighed against the future health risks of children who start smoking.

“Around three South Australians die every day from a smoking-related disease and we know most smokers took up the habit before they were 18 years old, so we have an obligation to do everything we can to prevent young people from ever starting,” Mr Hill said.

Mr Brennan, who acted after several complaints from the public, said the Health Department had begun using child volunteers, then given them shopping vouchers and, recently, started paying them.

He said this raised workplace safety issues, which should be addressed in a looming replacement for the now-lapsed Child Employment Bill 2011.

Businesses found selling to minors are liable for a $315 fine or loss of licence to sell tobacco.

that alternatives to children having to appear as witnesses in subsequent court cases should be investigated.

“The issues raised are not of concern in other jurisdictions; in a case before the Victorian Supreme court in 2000 (Rice v Tricouris), the judge found the involvement of young people was the `only viable and effective practice’ available for addressing the illegal sale of cigarettes,” Mr Hill said.

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