Plain packaging – those television interviews in full
Monday, December 3, 2012 at 11:22 
Email received following my TV appearance on Saturday:
Hi as a former smoker can I just say that letting your representative loose on BBC Breakfast this morning, Saturday 1 December has done your organisation no end of harm. Why would you not support ANY initiative to stop young people smoking? Surely you realise that as adults we all have a choice, but that children and teenagers should be discouraged from starting at every opportunity? Your representative was also aggressive, argumentative and unreasoned, not to mention extremely rude speaking over the other invited guest.
At least two presenters asked me pretty much the same question over the weekend. If it stops even one child from taking up smoking, surely plain packaging is a good thing?
The trouble is, how far do you go? If it stops even one child from smoking should we ban tobacco completely?
If I remember, I told at least one one presenter that we support all "reasonable" measures to stop children smoking. These include cracking down on shopkeepers who sell cigarettes to children and making it illegal to proxy purchase on behalf of children.
Plain packaging however is not reasonable. It's disproportionate because the impact is likely to be minimal, and if it encourages counterfeiters, as experts say it will, it will be counter-productive.
Anyway, have a look at the interviews on BBC Breakfast and decide for yourself whether I was "aggressive, argumentative and unreasoned, not to mention extremely rude"!! (I think she's referring to the discussion at 9.22.)
Check out too the interview with my wonderfully demure colleague Angela Harbutt who went head-to-head with Deborah Arnott of ASH on the BBC News channel:
Reader Comments (14)
Don't worry about the email Simon - the "ex-smoker" (yeah right) was almost certainly an ASH troublemaker trying to get you fired. Thought you were excellent. They just don't like it when they are challenged.
I agree. The tobacco control industry stooges are so dishonest they've forgotten what truth means.
"The Smoker" was undoubtedly a bitter smokerphobic anti who really doesn't care that the madness proposed by plain packaging will target children in a way not seen since the 50s and 60s.
The children are the excuse to punish adult consumers who they despise. There is no other reason for it or they would stop, think, and realise that the plan is very dangerous to children.
I
My grandchildren are in greater danger than even I was as a child because at least the tobacco I bought from shops unchallenged was regulated. My children were protected thanks to sensible and workable regulations but things have gone too far to be productive as you say.
I can only apologise to the smokerphobics for not being dead yet as a child smoker to older age - and I am not unique. Smoking will become vastly more lethal thanks to Tobacco Control bigotry and hatred.
They rely entirely upon FEAR.
We have all seen the aftermath of car crashes on the news again and again (even more horrific in films). Do we therefore abandon the use of our cars? Do we drive around in constant fear and trepidation?
Fear is a very short lived emotion, especially when it turns out that there is very little to be afraid of. This is all the more true with respect to children (and I do mean 'children' (say, up to 12 years old) as opposed to over 18s). If children get used to seeing these packets, by the time they are in their teens, they will have no fear. As Simon said, the idea of frightening children with these obscene pictures is about as counter-productive is it can get. Does anybody doubt that all the "NO SMOKING" signs all over the place are jolly good advertising for smoking? How can they not be when they constantly bring the idea of smoking into peoples' minds?
Arnott must be losing her marbles. She brought up another couple of scares - smoking makes AIDS worse and Diabetes worse. So we are all destined to get AIDS and Diabetes, are we?
I don't think that I would want to be friendly with these people. Their whole thought processes horrify me. There is no doubt in my mind that they would applaud with great delight a law which criminalised (with horrible consequences) parents smoking in front of their children, complete with a hot-line for children to report their parents. Frankly, I would avoid them like the plague.
Sorry Simon can't resist it
Left ugh! Right Mmmm!
I think it's really important to stop the media referring to Forest as a pro smoking organisation. ASH must love it. One nil up before the game starts. "We are not pro smoking, we are pro choice". The average man in the street immediately loses all sympathy for the ensuing arguments. It's been going on for years now.
Ex smoker has a very short memory. How many times in the past have you been cut over in debates while the anti’s where never allowed to be interrupted.
A few things I would like to see more of in your future encounters with the opposition are:
1) Turning the line about funding onto them.
2) Make a point of mentioning the growing number of ‘non smokers’ who getting fed up with ASH et all.
3) Every time a YouGov poll is mentioned, make it known who heads up YouGov and the fact he’s an ASH trustee.
4) When the subject of smoking cessation crops up, ask them why they never recommend cold turkey e-cigs etc. I think we know the answer to that one, odds on the masses don’t.
Your videos have ceased to exist Simon. Could it be that some decent, reasonable, tolerant person reported them to You Tube to save the cheeeeeeldren®?
Everything seems to be working fine, Mac. I know that office computers are sometimes set to block YouTube but I assume you're not at work.
Oh ho. If you click the timestamp hey-presto. If you click the screen, then you get the 'no soap' message. Crikey but Arnott's ghastly - her thought processes obviously...
I have to agree with a couple of the above comments - the split-screen picture at the bottom of the post really says it all.
I also agree with JB on Forest being pro-choice as opposed to pro-smoking, and with the comment by Adam about trying to highlight the points he outlines when doing interviews. Arnott et al are very skilled at steering the interview in their direction by forcing their opponent onto the back foot with manifestly untrue but popularly accepted stats and soundbites. They know that as soon as you get sidetracked into disputing those figures, then they've won, as the broadcast time is so limited.
Deborah slipped up in her opening sentence - "walk into any supermarket, actually any small shop ..." - these "iconic" packs that lure children in can't be seen in big shops anymore, nor will they be visible in small shops relatively soon. Which makes this whole proposal a bust.
On another note, Deborah isn't doing the anti-smoking measure any good. She looks like death warmed up.
There's a very interesting article here regarding happiness, longevity and how we process and respond to warnings. Tobacco warnings included. However, it has been long known that the mental state influences the body and the tobacco control movement seems never to have absorbed this information at all. I really fear for the damage these images will do to people.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20591893
What angers me about tobacco control (aside from the lying, smearing and the fact that TC itself is responsible for advertising smoking since the ban) is that they don't give a damn about the collateral damage they incur in their quest to stop The Young from taking up smoking. It matters not a jot that the lives of adult smokers of many years are being devastated in various ways and that for the poor and lonely smoking gives comfort. It is beyond the ken of TC that the feelings of deprivation caused by trying to stop smoking are enough to exacerbate depressiion and loneliness (especially prevalent in the elderly and poor). Try telling the 70 year old who has been widowed, who has little contact with an indifferent or distant family, whose social outings amount to attendance at an increasing number of funerals that his life is going to be transformed by quitting smoking. If he continues to smoke, however, he will be looked upon as the scum of the earth, may be denied medical treatment and, if he is treated in hospital, he should be prepared to expect zero sympathy when he depends on a caring nurse to wheel him outside in the cold and rain to have a longed-for cigarette
I'm on the wrong thread but I couldn't bring myself to extend wishes of peace and goodwill to tobacco control.
I totally agree with you Joyce. Very well said. Actually these gruesome pictures are being dumped on me right after a massive bereavement (a parent who was a lifelong non-smoker and 'did everything right' - yet still died an awful and prolonged death). The viewpoint of these people is so incredibly narrow and seems so oblivious to the complexity of many people's lives, griefs, thoughts and feelings that I can't understand why anyone listens to them at all. No-one wants to be 'beaten with sticks' most especially when they're already down. I also wonder (given that non-smokers get the same illnesses) - how people will feel who have recently lost a non-smoker to one of the illnesses so graphically thrown in their faces on these packages. I'm sure it would be absolutely traumatising for them.
A very interesting article this morning. Top five regrets of the dying. Being true to oneself is right at the top of the list:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying?CMP=EMCNEWEML1355