Formula 1 Grand Prix motor racing is a "fundamental gap" in the State's ban on smoking advertising, an Oireachtas committee was told.
"An advertising ban only works when it is complete. A 90 per cent ban does not get ninetenths of the effect," said Mr Tom Power, director of the new Office of Tobacco Control, set up by the Department of Health to implement its report, Towards a Tobacco Free Society.
"Where does our judgment lie?" he asked, at the meeting of the Committee on Health and Children. He accepted that a valid case could be made that the public service broadcaster should not be disadvantaged relative to other competitors.
"There is a question of law and a question of appropriate behaviour," he told Mr Batt O'Keeffe, the committee chairman. Mr O'Keeffe also asked Mr Tom Mooney of the Department of Health about the practicalities of banning Grand Prix advertising.
Mr Mooney said Grand Prix tobacco advertising was of major concern. "But in relation to television, you can't put a wall around the country," he said. "Even if Grand Prix racing was banned on RTE, it is available on the satellite channels. You have to be pragmatic about sponsorship."
In his submission, Mr Power said that "by branding Formula 1 racing so closely with tobacco products, we encounter the added difficulty that every time Formula 1 cars are exhibited, even if they do not contain the direct tobacco advertisement, they reinforce the tobacco message".
It would be of benefit "to understand the nature of the contract under which this product is being broadcast and the technical capabilities of the broadcaster to eliminate indirect advertising".
Mr Mooney, in the Department's submission, said that up to July last year £8 million was spent by the tobacco industry in Ireland on advertising and sponsorship but this had been effectively cut to zero when the Department banned it.
He said, however, that "an EU-wide ban on all forms of advertising and sponsorship of tobacco products is necessary if we are to reduce children's inducement to tobacco products".
