Tobacco industry mounts rear guard action against plain packaging
Britain’s tobacco industry is upping the ante over plans to mandate plain packaging on all cigarettes with the publication of the latest phase of an ongoing advertising campaign in national newspapers.
JTI, the international tobacco manufacturer, has filed a freedom of information request to the UK department of Health which produced email correspondence confirming that there is no hard evidence to support the notion that it works.
Jorge da Motta, managing director of JTI UK said: “We are using this media campaign to demonstrate that in 2011 even the Department of Health accepted that these proposals are not supported by any hard evidence.
“We hope common sense will prevail and that the Government will disregard this proposal, before embarking on a process which will do nothing more than deprive the Treasury of much needed revenue and make hundreds of millions of pounds for the criminals who manufacture, distribute and sell illegal tobacco products.
“We have always argued that plain packaging will not prevent children from smoking, but enforcing existing initiatives such as ‘No ID, No Sale’, punishing those who buy tobacco on the behalf of children and cutting the illegal supply chain, can work.”