They can't help themselves. Anyone who contradicts the tobacco control industry must be a stooge of Big Tobacco.
Responding to the ASI report on plain packaging (see previous post), Deborah Arnott, chief executive of ASH, says:
“The Adam Smith Institute, by publishing this report, is acting as the mouthpiece for the tobacco industry, as it has done on many previous occasions. It should come as no great surprise that the Institute takes a pro-tobacco line but it should be more transparent about its association with Big Tobacco.”
According to ASH:
The Adam Smith Institute, which describes itself as “the UK’s leading libertarian think tank”, has close ties with the tobacco industry.
"Close ties"? "Many previous occasions"?
ASH offers just two items of evidence. The first - the minutes of a tobacco industry meeting - is dated September 8, 1992. It appears to suggest that 20 years ago the companies funded "a two-phased Adam Smith Institute project on a counter-defence of the traditional values of European individual freedom". Shocking, truly shocking. Not.
The second barely qualifies as evidence. It's merely an allegation that:
According to an internal Philip Morris International memo, the Institute would conduct training for journalists on free market principles that would be “ideologically consistent with [Philip Morris’] issues and interests”.
And with that a world famous think tank, founded in 1977 (35 years ago), to be dismissed as a "mouthpiece for the tobacco industry". It would be laughable if it wasn't so pathetic.
Curiously the Department of Health has also responded to the ASI report by issuing this statement by public health minister Anne Milton:
"We know there is not one simple answer to reducing smoking rates - that is why plain packaging is one part of a range of initiatives we are looking at.
"We are looking at whether the plain packaging of tobacco could be effective in reducing in particular the number of young people who take up smoking plus also to help adult smokers to quit.
"Anyone with views on the idea is encouraged to take part in the consultation when it is published."
OK, it's pretty bland but why would the DoH feel the need to issue any response to the ASI report unless they perceive it to be a threat to their grand plan?
Surely Milton and her cronies should be adopting a studiously neutral role prior to the consultation?
Oh, silly me, I forgot. Anne Milton and Deborah Arnott are close professional buddies (Minister's links with ASH questioned). In fact, if it wasn't for this picture some might think they are one and the same person.
Update on Monday, February 20, 2012 at 8:20 by
Simon Clark
The ASI says: "We commissioned this report ourselves because it reflects our free market, libertarian principles. Indeed, the Adam Smith Institute does not do commissioned research.
"However, there are a couple of tobacco companies that have corporate subscriptions at the Institute. The revenue from this – while welcome – is not terribly significant. It amounted to less than three percent of our 2011 income.
"Moreover, neither of these companies has played any role whatsoever in the production or editing of this report. We take our independence very seriously."
See also Chris Snowdon's version of events.