Tobacco Products Directive, like Christmas, is coming …

The newly-appointed European Commissioner for health and consumer affairs, Dr. Tonio Borg, is said to have forwarded the proposed new Tobacco Products Directive to the Commissioner’s College for vetting and approval, according to a Malta Today story of December 2.

This may pave the way for the proposal and previous directive drafts to be seen, before too long, by MEPs. In a question to the Commission, MEP, Kartika Tamara Liotard, had asked:

1.         ‘Can the Commission – upholding the principle of Commission transparency – forward to Parliament the new Tobacco Directive or a draft thereof, in the form in which it existed when Commissioner [John] Dalli resigned?

2.         ‘How many previous provisional versions of the Tobacco Directive were there, and can the Commission also, as a matter of urgency, forward these previous versions to Parliament?’

On Tuesday last week, the Commission replied that, so far, neither the members of the Commission nor their respective services had discussed the upcoming proposal to revise the directive.

‘The Commission inter-service consultation has not yet taken place and no draft has been submitted to the College for adoption,’ said the written reply. ‘In these circumstances, the Commission considers that transmission to the European Parliament of internal drafts by the Directorate general for Health and Consumers is premature.’