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Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 23 Nov 1960

Vol. 185 No. 1

Poisons Bill, 1960—Second Stage

I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time.

Have we not just dealt with that?

No. All we have done is to advance a measure which will give greater relief to the children of future generations in this country and which will considerably——

I think we have disposed of that measure for the time being.

We have, Sir. The first of the Acts relating to the control of poisons in this country was the Arsenic Act of 1851. This Act required sellers of arsenic to keep records of sales and prohibited its sale to persons who were not known to the seller or to a witness at the sale.

Under the Poisons (Ireland) Act of 1870, which is still the backbone of our legislation on this subject, a much wider form of control was introduced. The Act listed a number of poisons and certain provisions were made in relation to each class of poison. Containers of all poisons must, in accordance with the Act, be labelled with the word "poison" and with the name and address of the seller and restrictions on sale similar to those I have described for arsenic were introduced for a number of other poisons. When under the Pharmacy (Ireland) Act of 1875, statutory provision was made for the registration of pharmaceutical chemists, the keeping of open shop for the sale of poisons was controlled, by restricting such sale mainly to these chemists.

The legislation of 1870 and 1875 was amended in 1908 to permit of trade in poisons for agricultural and veterinary purposes by persons licensed by the local authority.

This whole code of law is now out of date and is defective in other respects.

While, for instance, there is a procedure under which new poisons can be added to the Schedule contained in the 1870 Act, there is no provision under which new poisons can be removed from that Schedule, or under which the nomenclature in the Schedule can be brought up-to-date. Chloroform is a case in point. It is a scheduled poison but, in certain presentations, it is innocuous and the controls under the Poisons Acts are not necessary for such presentations. This, and certain other, presentations of poisons—for example, in solid soaps—could be excluded from the scope of the statutory controls on poisons.

There is no provision in the code under which any new form of control could be introduced, such, for example, as restricting the sale of certain poisons to those holding medical prescriptions.

The existing code does not permit of the variation in degrees of control necessary for some of the newer and more complex substances.

Somewhat different provisions relating to labelling other than the simple printing of the word "poison" might be desirable in some cases. Carbon tetrachloride is a common constituent of substances sold to remove stains from clothes. The fumes of this substance, when it is used in a confined space, have been known to cause death and it would be desirable that the label should have printed on it a warning against this danger.

In addition to simple provisions governing sale, it may be desirable in some cases to regulate the manufacture of poisons.

Finally, the penalties fixed almost a century ago by the Act of 1870 are no longer an adequate deterrent and should be increased.

For all these reasons, it has been decided that the time has come to ask the legislature to repeal the old code in its entirety and to replace it by a new Statute.

The Bill now before the House will be the basis of that new code. It provides that the details of the controls on poisons and their sale and disposal will be spelled out in regulations to be made by the Minister and not in the legislation itself. For that reason I have described it as the foundation of the new code. This, as Deputies will be aware, is a common modern practice and while delegated legislation such as this may be criticised and on occasion deprecated by some, I feel that there is a very good case for it in this instance. New substances, including a wide variety of synthetic products, for use in medical, and veterinary practice and in agriculture, are being evolved year by year. Many of these are of a nature which requires control over their distribution and use, and it would be impracticable to expect the legislature to devote the necessary time to dealing ad hoc with special Bills every time control of a new product was deemed to be necessary for the public safety. Indeed, the delays involved in the preparation and the passage of such legislation might well be dangerous.

A feature of the Bill is the proposal to establish a new council—Comhairle na Nimheanna—to advise the Minister, and the Minister for Agriculture, on the exercise of their functions under the Act and generally on questions relating to poisons. There is no such advisory body at present, but, under the 1870 Act, the Royal College of Physicians have the function of declaring substances to be appropriate for addition to the Poisons Schedule.

If such a declaration is approved by the Government the poison is added to the Schedule. The proposal in the Bill to confer a power somewhat similar to this on a new body rather than on the College of Physicians should not be construed as a criticism of the latter body. I am satisfied that the College have always carried out their limited functions under the 1870 Act with discretion, competence and care. If, however, I may be permitted to express my views by a metaphor—in no way unkindly intended, I can assure the House—the operation of a bad machine by even the best mechanics cannot make it work well.

The development of veterinary medicine and of the pharmaceutical industry since the first legislation was introduced makes it appropriate for us now, when considering where we should look for advice in relation to poisons, to establish a body whose membership will not be restricted to the medical profession alone.

I will now refer briefly to the major provisions of the Bill. Section 2 provides for the establishment of Comhairle na Nimheanna and Section 3 defines the functions of this Council. These are to advise the Minister or the Minister for Agriculture on appropriate matters in relation to poisons which are referred to them for advice. They may also be asked to advise on certain regulations under Section 65 of the Health Act, 1947, relating to the advertisement and sale of medical preparations, which may be appropriate for referral to that Council rather than to the National Health Council. As a possible subject matter for such regulations, there is the question of the control of the sale of substances known as tranquillisers. There is a certain amount of evidence in my Department that there is some danger in these being too freely available and, while I cannot anticipate the advice of the new Council on this matter, I would say that it may be appropriate to make regulations to control their sale.

The Chairman and the members of the Council will be appointed by the Minister for Health. Under Section 4, it will consist of two doctors, two pharmaceutical chemists, two veterinary surgeons, one specialist in the use of poisonous substances in agriculture and three other persons. The Minister, under Section 7, may determine the tenure of office of the Chairman and the members. He will also appoint the Secretary to the Council. The Minister may also by order fix a procedure for calling meeting of the Council and specify the quorum, but, apart from this, the Council will regulate its own procedure and business.

Under Section 9, the Minister may remove a member of the Council from office. Sections 10 to 13 contain the usual provisions in relation to resignation of members, filling of casual vacancies and the payment of the members' expenses in attending meetings or otherwise doing work on behalf of the Council.

The core of the Bill is in Section 14. Under this section will be made new regulations to replace the existing legislation which I have described. The Minister will have power to define by regulation what will be poisons for the purposes of the controls to be specified under the regulations. The storage, transport, supply and sale of poisons and the manufacture of pharmaceutical preparations containing poisons can all be governed by the regulations.

Sub-section (3) of this Section specifies in more detail a number of the matters which may be covered by the regulations under the Section. These include the specification of the persons who may deal in different classes of poisons. While I do not like to appear to anticipate the recommendations of Comhairle na Nimheanna, I think we can expect that, as at present, retail trade in poisons generally will continue to be restricted to pharmaceutical chemists and druggists and that other shops will, as at present, be licensed by health authorities to sell poisons only for specific purposes, such as for use in agriculture. This sub-section will provide for an appeal to the Minister against a refusal by a health authority to grant a licence to deal in poisons. There is no such right of appeal under the existing legislation but in more recent similar provisions—such as the Food Hygiene Regulations of 1950—it is customary to concede it. This sub-section also makes it clear that the regulations can govern the labelling of containers of poisons and provides that regulations may be enforced by the officers of the Minister for Health or the Minister for Agriculture, by the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland or by health authorities.

Under Section 15, the Minister for Agriculture will be given a new power to regulate the use of poisons for agriculture and for veterinary purposes. This power will be exercised to ensure that persons using or coming into contact with poisons used as weed killers or insecticides, or otherwise in agriculture or horticulture, will observe proper precautions.

While the Minister for Health, or the Minister for Agriculture, will normally be required to consult Comhairle na Nimheanna before making regulations, it is provided by Section 16 that urgent regulations can be made first and advice in regard to them obtained afterwards.

Penalties for contraventions of the Regulations are provided for in Section 17. These penalties, which may range up to a fine of £100 or imprisonment for six months, are considerably more severe than those under the present legislation.

Section 18 includes the usual provisions on the laying of regulations before the Houses of the Oireachtas and Section 19 the normal provision for meeting the expenses of the Ministers with functions under the Act.

The purpose of Section 20 is to bring up-to-date certain references in the Dangerous Drugs Act, 1934, to international conventions which were originally made under the auspices of the League of Nations and have now been adopted by the United Nations. These changes in the 1934 Act are necessary to enable certain regulations under that Act to be made.

Under Section 21 all the present law relating to the control of poisons will be repealed. It will be noted, however, that under Section 22 the Minister can bring part of the Act in before the balance of it. The intention is that the provision for setting up the new Council will first be brought in ans that the provision for the repeal of the present laws will not have effect until a later date when, appropriate regulations having been made, we are ready to dispense with these laws.

I think the House will welcome the Minister's statement on this Bill. The principal provision of the Bill, as the Minister has pointed out, is the establishment of this new advisory council. In relation to this measure we are legislating in a very definite way by regulation and the Minister himself conceded in his opening remarks that the control of poison and poisonous substances, their definition, restriction on their sale, manufacture, supply and so on will now become a matter to a very large extent of Ministerial regulation made on the advice of the Council.

As a person who has frequently objected to legislation by regulation I do believe that dealing with poison and poisonous substances by means of regulation would prove better than depending on old legislation which, as the Minister has pointed out, is not flexible and in modern conditions does not give health authorities or the Minister himself sufficient power or authority to deal with such matters, particularly in the case of a new manufacture or innovations of one sort or another. In this instance I certainly am not prepared to press any objection to the fact that the Bill will largely be legislation by regulation.

The kernel of the Bill is Section 14. It deals with the type of regulations which the Minister may make after consultation with the council.

I should like the Minister to give some more information to the House regarding Section 16 which provides that, in cases of emergency, the Minister may make his regulations without consultation with the Council. The section goes on to provide that, having made his regulations in this particular situation of emergency which may have developed, the Minister will then consult the Council but there is a full stop there and the Bill does not make it clear what is to happen if the council disagrees with the Minister, if they advise the Minister that he should rescind the regulations which he has made or that he should vary them in some way or another. I take it it would be the intention of any Minister to have regard to the advice given by the council and it would be as well that the Minister should endeavour to deal in Section 16 with the action to be taken by a Minister for Health in the event of a regulation having been made as a matter or urgency under Section 16 and then, when it goes before the council, the council say to the Minister that they think the regulations should be rescinded or cancelled. The Minister should have regard to their advice in that respect.

The only other comment I want to make is in relation to the constitution of the council which is being establashed under Section 4. It is provided that the council will consist of 10 persons, two of whom would be registered medical practitioners, two registered chemists and two others veterinary surgeons nominated by the Minister for Agriculture. I do not know whether the Minister would consider that this suggestion has any merit but it is one into which he might look. It would seem to me that this council has a very important rôle to play and that the advice which the Minister will receive from it from time to time generally regarding the question of the control of poisonous substances will not be taken lightly by any Minister for Health. That being so, I suggest to the Minister that it might be as well now that provision should be made in the Bill that whatever medical practitioners, veterinary surgeons or chemists are appointed to the council they will be people of some practical experience in their profession.

As the Bill stands—I am not suggesting that this would be done—it will be open to the Minister or to any successor of his to appoint a newly qualified doctor, veterinary surgeon or chemist who has not even a day's practical experience. I know that that would not be the intention of any Minister for Health who is serious in relation to this matter but it is not unknown in legislation of this type where professional qualifications are required for particular appointments to lay down in the legislation that so many years experience should be regarded as a necessary qualification. I would ask the Minister to look into that point.

I should like to express my approval also of this measure. The necessity for the measure is obvious and I suppose the statement in the explanatory memorandum is a source of wonder to us that "the legislation at present governing the control of the sale of poisons in this country dates back to 1851 and the latest enactment on the subject was the Poisons and Pharmacy Act, 1908." I suppose all of us must take a certain amount of blame for that. Whether or not new legislation was necessary over the years we do not know because we do not know what ill effects have arisen due to lack of legislation such as this. Whilst I am also more or less of the same mind as Deputy M.J. O'Higgins and most members of the House with regard to legislation by regulation, the introduction of this method by the Minister, making regulations to do certain things, is one that could be readily approved in view of the type of abuse it is intended to prevent and in view of the safeguards it is desirable to make, safeguards that must be made immediately.

In that respect I should also like to make a comment on something Deputy O'Higgins said with regard to the necessity for the Minister to make regulations without consultation with An Comhairle Nimheanna. The Minister is never bound to accept the advice of the council. Certainly it is desirable that he should listen to them —they are there to give advice—but I assume and I think it is implied in the Bill, that if the Minister has to make emergency regulations he will consult with the council afterwards but he does not necessarily have to take their views.

The constitution of the council does not seem to present any difficulties and at first glance should not give rise to any objections. Most of the people mainly concerned with poisons and drugs and who have wide experience of their handling and sale are included in it both from the health and the veterinary point of view. The Minister is very wise to include a provision that three other persons may be appointed to the council because it gives him pretty wide scope and will enable him to make the council as representative as possible. I assume the other three persons will not be people with any particular qualifications. I do not think it would be desirable to select them because of particular qualifications. The Minister should really select them as three citizens and no more, without specifying any particular qualifications.

A provision with which I am particularly pleased is one which has been absent from much of our recent legislation dealing with the Departments of Local Government and Health vis-á-vis the local bodies; that is the provision for appeal to the Minister. That is a very desirable provision because there was a feeling of frustration, a feeling that there is not true democracy in the local bodies, when a local body gives a decision for or against a certain proposal and the aggrieved person has no appeal. The Minister has wisely provided for an appeal to himself if a person is aggrieved by the withholding or the cancellation of a licence.

Generally, the people will welcome the Bill. There has not been an uproar or outcry, but there has certainly been a great deal of concern recently about the sale of tranquillisers mentioned by the Minister. Scores of various tranquillisers and what people call "pep balls" are sold. I am not a medical man. I do not know what effect they can have on the health of an individual, but they must have some ill effects. There must be some cumulative effects from these tranquillisers or "pep" pills which are sold pretty freely.

It is a very good thing that the Minister may make an emergency regulation because unscrupulous people who want to sell these tranquillisers or "pep" pills will find ways and means of avoiding any regulation previously made. They can do that within a relatively short time. Before a council could meet and deliberate on the new tranquilliser or "pep" pill thousands of them could be sold in the country, but if the Minister and his Department act quickly the sale of that sort of commodity can be stopped very quickly. The provisions for fines and imprisonment should be sufficient deterrent.

There is one omission from the Bill which perhaps the Minister will consider. The Bill provides generally against the sale of poisonous and dangerous drugs only in certain circumstances. It refers to them as absolute poisons. There are other commodities that can be poisonous to children. Is there any regulation, or can the Minister take power in this Bill, to prevent the sale of medicine or pills that an adult would treat with respect but which children from seven to fourteen years of age would not treat with discretion and would not know what was contained in them? Day after day thousands of children are sent to chemist shops for aspirins and pills. They are sent with prescriptions that could be fatal to children if a few children got together and decided to have a lark and take these pills. It has happened. Thank God, there have been very few occasions. There is that danger.

There is a law that prohibits the sale of cigarettes to children under a certain age and a shopkeeper can be prosecuted for selling cigarettes to such children. Is there any regulation, or can the Minister take power in this Bill, to prevent a child of, say, five years of age buying a bottle of aspirins? Aspirins are not very palatable to a child. Most medicines and pills are not palatable to young children. On the other hand, there are cough mixtures which are palatable and which could prove fatal if taken in excess. I hope I am not making a commercial plug but there is a sweetened form of aspirin. They are sweetened to make them more acceptable to children. There is the danger that if a young child is sent for a bottle of pills that have been flavoured with lemon, orange or raspberry he may take a handful, whereas anything in excess of three or four might be dangerous and even fatal.

If the Minister has not power in this Bill to deal with a situation of that kind, I would ask him to consider the matter between now and the Committee Stage. It may be included in the Bill, but I cannot find it.

Apart from that, this is a good Bill which will be approved, not only by the House, but by everybody in the country in view of the danger there is at the present time from the sale of pills, tranquillisers and so on.

I, also, would like to welcome the Bill but there are a few matters to which I wish to refer. The Bill controls the sale of poisonous drugs but, unfortunately, no effort is being made to control the importation of poisonous drugs. The fisheries of this country, particularly in Donegal, are being ruined by the importation of a poison called Cymac or Cyanide. It is being imported from the Six Counties, Scotland and England by gentlemen who come in to poach. They have actually ruined our rivers. At least three of the rivers in Donegal this year have been destroyed as a result of the importation of this poison. There appears to be no control whatsoever over the importation of this substance by individuals who have purchased it from drug stores or chemist shops across the Border or in Britain.

If some control could be exercised over the importation of poisonous drugs it would be for the benefit of the community generally. About six weeks ago I came across a case where a drug was purchased in Strabane, the sale entered in the poisons register and the drug brought across to this country and used here. It was a mere fluke, an accident, that the source of the drug was discovered. If that drug had been purchased in this country and a proper poisons register kept, if an incident such as the one to which I refer occurred it would have been possible, by examination of the poisons register in the various chemist shops, to put a finger on the culprit immediately.

The other matter to which I wish to refer is the members of the council. There appears to be no provision for the period for which they shall hold office. That is a mistake because, if we refer to Section 9, the Minister may at any time remove a member of the council from office. I am not suggesting that the present Minister would do so but there could come a time when we would have a Minister who for personal reasons would remove an individual from the council. I am afraid that such a person, if once removed, would never again become eligible for reappointment by the Minister who removed him or by the Minister who succeeded him because Section 10 says:

A member of the Council whose term of Office expires by effluxion of time shall be eligible for reappointment.

There is no mention of a member whose term expired by reason of its termination by the Minister. I am sure it is an oversight. It is a matter that the Minister could possibly look into and see if he could amend it. I would much prefer to see the members of the council appointed for a particular period, during which time they could not be removed, and leave the option to the Minister of the day to renew their appointments or appoint others in their places.

There are just a few questions that I should like to ask the Minister. Everybody will welcome the Bill in so far as it provides a safeguard for our people. In these days when preparations and drugs of all kinds are on the market it is well that people should know where danger lies. Lists of dangerous drugs should be available to the public. I would ask the Minister whether the council will be the authority to decide what substances are dangerous or are near being dangerous or whether they will report to the Minister and he will be the deciding authority as to the drugs that should be characterised as dangerous or otherwise.

I intended to raise the point adverted to by Deputy O'Donnell. It does not state for how long the members of this Comhairle are to hold office—whether for three years, five years, an indefinite period or until such time as they desire to cry off.

I realise full well that a Bill of this kind is necessary. I should further like to ask whether this authority will have any power to decide what substances should be used in the preparation of medicines or certain pills. Will these preparations still be made available in the ordinary way? Will manufacturing chemists or concerns heretofore engaged in the production of these still operate freely? Will the authority have any say in the matter?

I am grateful to the House for the manner in which it has received this Bill. One must realise that when breaking what might be described as new ground in the sense that we are widening the scope of the authority to control the sale of poison there may be aspects of the Bill which the Minister has overlooked. I do not think, however, that any great difficulty will arise under Section 16. That is the section under which the Minister may make a regulation to deal with an emergency. The regulation can be subject to amendment when the advice of the council has been considered by the Minister, but if there is any great apprehension about the action of any future Minister under this section, I could consider whether the public should not be given some sort of warning by the publication of a notice in the newspapers that this regulation was made before the Comhairle had been consulted. Under the Bill as it stands, the regulation would be tabled, and the House, having due notice that the Council had not been consulted, might wish to debate it. A motion to annul the regulation could be put down in order to discuss the circumstances in which the regulation was made. I would not see any objection to that procedure.

With regard to the question of the council, we have to act on the assumption that Ministers, to whatever Party they belong, are responsible men. Section 9 gave me a great deal of thought. I decided that, after all, no Minister is likely to remove a member of the council from office unless such member has shown himself unworthy of holding the office, but the fact that a Minister has removed a person from office does not debar that Minister or his successor from reappointing the member in due course.

Would the Minister just examine that? Section 10 would seem to imply that it is only in cases of termination by effluxion of time that he can reappoint.

I noted that. I shall make it quite clear that a person will not be debarred from reappointment simply because a Minister or his predecessor had removed him from office. Though there is nothing in the Bill about fixing a limited period for membership or saying in regard to nomination it can only be for a period not exceeding X years, nevertheless if any other Minister wishes to change the personnel of the Council he should be at liberty to do so.

If you do not do that, they might go on until they become senile.

It is not my intention to appoint them in perpetuity or for life. As has been said, it is very desirable that people reappointed should be persons of practical experience and I would suggest—and this is even more important—that they should be persons of high professional standards. The position should be left open so that if there were a professor of pharmacology who was continued in this professorship, he might be continued a member of the council. It has been made quite clear in Section 10 that if I do fix a maximum term, they can be reappointed for a further term. That, I think, would cover the matter.

Deputy O'Higgins raised in my mind just this question as to whether I should not say that a person reappointed shall have been a practitioner of so many years' experience and shall have certain post-graduate qualifications. I shall look into it to see if I can do that. In the first place, the code which this supersedes was felt to be very inflexible and professional qualifications in relation to these matters may change completely within a very short term of years. The Minister will act on his own responsibility. He is bound to consult the council. He is bound to procure their advice, but he is not necessarily bound to act upon it. He must carry his own responsibility and if he is to be responsible to the House, he must be in a position to reject the advice of the council and stand or fall by his own act in so rejecting; otherwise, he would become a mere rubber-stamp for the council and the House would lose all authority and control in relation to this very important matter.

Deputy Manley raised the question whether we had any power under this Bill to prohibit the importation of dangerous drugs. As the Bill stands, we have not; but whether we should have or not is a matter to which I should like to give some consideration. Even if the Minister were empowered to prohibit by regulation the importation of dangerous drugs, I think if they were imported for the purposes to which Deputy O'Donnell referred it would be very very difficult indeed to enforce the prohibition. As I say, it is an important point and I shall look into it.

More difficult is the question which Deputy Corish raised. It relates to drugs which, though harmless when taken in prescribed does by the persons for whom they are intended, may be harmful if they fall into the hands of children or people of little experience. I am afraid it would be impossible for us to deal very effectively with that, although we have the power under Section 14 to prohibit the selling of drugs by "persons or classes of persons other that the persons or classes of persons specified in the regulation or otherwise than subject to the conditions and limitations specified in the regulations." I think that power is sufficiently wide to enable us to make regulations prohibiting the sale of drugs to a particular class of persons.

I again say that we can make regulations to that effect. It might be a very difficult provision to administer because, after all, there is a lesson to be learned from the comparative failure of the Act which endeavoured to limit the sale of cigarettes to young people. I do not think anyone can say that provision is strictly enforced in this country, or strictly enforceable. As I say, we have the power to limit the sale of drugs to normal people to quantities which are comparatively harmless. We can endeavour to ensure that they will not be sold to young people who have not enough commonsense to use them in a manner which will not be dangerous to other people or even themselves.

With regard to tranquillisers or the stimulating drugs to which Deputy Corish referred, they, of course, can be dealt with under the regulations and. as I mentioned here before, it is my intention, if the Bill becomes law, at an early date to refer certain drugs which are supposed to have a tranquillising effect to the Comhairle for advice.

Indeed, one of the things which influenced my officers and myself in the preparation of this Bill was the number of complaints we received from parents and others who have suffered by reason of the fact that persons can become addicted to certain of these preparations. It was on examination of those complaints that the need for a completely new up-to-date code for the control of poisons and drugs was forced upon us.

Question put and agreed to.

This day fortnight. I promised the Pharmaceutical Society and others that I would consider their suggestions for an amendment of the Bill, if necessary.

Committee Stage ordered for Wednesday, 7th December, 1960.
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