Plain packaging on tobacco products is not coming into force today as planned.
There has been a delay in pushing through the required legislation due in part to the length of time it took to form a government.
Plain cigarette packets will start hitting shelves today in the UK. The plain packs are intended to make cigarettes less atrractive to young smokers and children.
Ireland's Health Minister Simon Harris is now coming under pressure to live up to commitments to ban branded cigarette packets here.
As a European deadline on plain packaging for tobacco passes, campaigners warned the crackdown was a minor and technical law which should be a priority for the new minority government.
Some of the world's biggest cigarette makers - Philip Morris International, British American Tobacco, Imperial Tobacco and Japan Tobacco International - failed to stop the branding controls in Britain.
Source: Irish Examiner, 20/05/16