US embassy cable - 04DUBLIN1584

UNCLAS DUBLIN 001584 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ECON, ETRD, SENV 
SUBJECT: AMBASSADOR WEIGHS IN WITH ENVIRONMENT MINISTER 
AGAINST GUM TAX 
 
 
1.  On October 18, the Ambassador, Chicago-based Wrigleys CEO 
Ronald Waters, and UK Wrigleys Chief Officer Alistair Whalley 
met with the newly appointed Minister for the Environment and 
Local Government, Dick Roche, to discuss alternatives to the 
Irish Government's proposed 5-cent-per-pack chewing gum tax. 
The tax, which would raise revenues to clean streets soiled 
by discarded gum, would not change Ireland's permissive 
attitudes toward litter, while dampening gum sales, explained 
the Wrigleys representatives.  As an alternative, Wrigleys 
had offered the GOI a financial commitment to establish an 
industry board that would build anti-littering social 
awareness through educational programs and stronger 
enforcement of littering fines.  Waters mentioned that pilot 
programs using this approach in the UK had reduced gum litter 
by 50 percent, and the Ambassador added that the civic pride 
fostered by such programs would help to diminish littering 
and clean-up costs over the long run.  Waters also stressed 
that the industry continued to work on making gum more 
bio-degradable, with the challenge of retaining anti-cavity 
ingredients that had led the dental profession to endorse 
gum-chewing. 
 
2.  Roche said that the GOI sought a well-rounded approach to 
gum litter problems and would seriously consider Wrigleys 
proposal before the October 29 deadline on the public comment 
period for the proposed gum tax.  He noted that 90 million 
packs of gum were sold annually in Ireland and that discarded 
gum accounted for roughly 18 percent of food-related street 
litter, with the proportion rising as smokers switched to gum 
with the recent ban on smoking in public places.  He added 
that gum's stickiness led typical small towns to spend euro 
40,000 per year on street sprayings.  Roche acknowledged the 
logic in Wrigleys' argument that changes in social behavior 
offered the best long-run solution to gum litter problems, 
but cautioned that the GOI was under pressure from local 
governments to be seen as tackling these problems in the two 
years left before general elections.  The tax, if 
implemented, would be a visible measure that would help local 
governments to cover clean-up costs in that short span, said 
Roche.  He added that the Department of the Environment had 
not made a final decision on the tax and would continue to 
consult with Wrigleys and the industry over the coming weeks. 
 
3.  Comment: Roche, a former International Visitors Program 
participant, is a close Embassy contact and favorably 
disposed toward the United States.  In his former post as 
Minister of State for European Affairs at the Department of 
Foreign Affairs, he was an important USG interlocutor during 
Ireland's recent EU presidency.  Roche was also a central 
player in Member States' negotiations on the EU Constitution, 
and his appointment to the Environment Department was seen as 
a reward for such efforts.  Roche made environmental issues a 
focus of his 12-year parliamentary career and has told the 
Ambassador that he entered politics out of anger over illegal 
waste dumps in his Wicklow constituency. 
KENNY