Swedish MEP Charlie Weimers has come out strongly against the compromise by the European Union on the excise tax on tobacco.
He told Brussels Signal today on the side lines of the World Tobacco Congress that the taxes the EU hopes to introduce do not stand a chance in Sweden.
Weimers said the European Commission wants to change the new proposed tax to €107 per kilogram of nicotine, down from the original level of €143.
Such a tax would mean a fivefold increase for Swedish consumers.
“I want to send a clear message to Olivér Várhelyi,” the European Commissioner for Health and Animal Welfare, “and the Commission,” Weimers said.
“This will not fly, this is dead on arrival.”
The MEP said that any government of Sweden, be it conservative or progressive, would not survive a fivefold tax increase on all nicotine products.
He noted that users of alternative nicotine products were present in all political parties and willing to fight hard over the issue and that pure electoral politics alone would stop this proposal.
He wondered why the EC was “wasting its time”.
Weimers noted Sweden was not alone and has allies, explicitly naming Italy a “good ally”.
But, he noted, Sweden could stop the excise taxes on tobacco on its own, “we do have our veto”.
”It’s in our own hands and the Commission should recognise that.”
Weimers said several Swedish ministers have gone out on record saying they will not accept the compromise.
The EU wants to introduce taxes on nicotine products and add it to its own budget at a time when it overall wants more money.
Weimers said that it was “ironic” that the EC wants to base its budget on a product it wants to diminish, against which it goes on a crusade.
He said that the EC should accept that it simply was “not a realistic source of income” and should consider other options or accept resistance and defeat.
Before speaking to Brussels Signal, Weimers gave a speech to the nicotine industry in Brussels.
He first gave them a verbal beating for what he saw as mistakes in the past, where they disingenuously claimed tobacco was not so harmless.
Weimers said they have lied to people and caused many deaths.
“You poisoned the air and the public debate.”
He went on to say, though, that things have changed and they were now too tame and fearful.
“Now the anti-nicotine lobby became the merchants of death,” he said.
Weimers said that the anti-group were such moral puritans that they caused more damage than good.
At the same time the nicotine industry has moved on and is working on healthier products but that by blocking it, their opponents were causing real harm while “the evidence is overwhelming”.
He praised the Swedish model that accepted harm reduction and said that such realism and pragmatism has proved to be the best way forward.
