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It's Stoptober, when smokers are being encouraged to quit the addiction, and Maori Party MP Marama Fox says it's time to step up the pace to tobacco reform.
She yesterday accepted a petition from the Smokefree Northland Coalition Patu Puauahi calling for a ban on smoking in cars with tamariki inside.
Mrs Fox says the Maori Party is a strong advocate of the policy for Aotearoa to be smokefree by 2025.
But progress on a bill for plain packaging has stalled awaiting the outcome of legal challenges by tobacco giant Phillip Morris to Australia's plain packaging law
"Now I'm saying and the whanau in Northland are saying it's time to move on our own goal and worry about what we are doing here in New Zealand and the Government should not allow themselves to be hamstrung by the bullying tactics of global corporate industry and we should just keep moving forward towards our goal," she says.
Marama Fox says plans to deliver the petition to Associate Health Minister Sam Lotu-Iiga and to the Maori Affairs Committee.
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