What have the tobacco companies ever done for us?
Tuesday, April 10, 2012 at 13:40 In typical Internet fashion the comments on the previous post have deviated significantly from the original subject – smokers' rights, direct action and civil disobedience.
Goebbels has made his customary appearance and even Al Quaeda (sorry, Phil) got a mention.
Meanwhile Pensioner Ellie commented: "I have always wondered why we receive no support from the tobacco companies, the pubcos and landlords and groups like CAMRA - surely it's in their interest to back us?"
PE's comments are always thoughtful and considered but this merited a response, and on a thread of its own. So here is it:
Ellie, it's incorrect to say the tobacco companies don't support the consumer. They do, via donations to Forest (for example) and initiatives such as Imperial Tobacco's Smoking Allowed project.
The money may not be as much as we would like but we appreciate their support. Do other industries (the food and drink industries, for example) support the consumer like this?
The biggest problem, however, is not money, it's consumer apathy and no media campaign is going to change that. Believe me, we've tried.
At some point, I hope, there will be moment when hundreds of thousands of people react and say 'Enough's enough'. For whatever reason, that point has not yet been reached.
Finally, as a member of Imperial Tobacco's Stakeholder Panel, I can confirm that the companies do listen to the consumer and they are aware of the frustrations that are expressed by some consumers on blogs such as this.
That said, the views expressed here and on other smoking-related websites are often very different to those expressed by consumer focus groups. I've sat in on a few and I have never heard the words Goebbels, Third Reich or Al Quaeda mentioned in relation to tobacco control.
I would add that a lot of work in support of the consumer takes place behind the scenes but – and Forest has made this point several times to the companies – more needs to be done to demonstrate public support for their beleaguered customers.
Simon Clark
Imperial Tobacco has just opened an ‘Airside Smoking Balcony’ at Birmingham Airport (above).
It's the biggest airside smoking area in the UK and from this week it will include stools and a departure board.
"The next stage of the Smoking Allowed project," says UK Communications Manager Iain Watkins, "will see the completion of activity at Glasgow Airport, Manchester Airport, Newcastle Airport, Exeter Airport and an industry hub in Bristol."
No, I don't know what an "industry hub" is either, but I'll try and find out.
Reader Comments (19)
Thank you Simon, I didn't realise we were receiving so much support from the tobacco companies but perhaps that is because, as you say, a lot of their activities are behind the scenes.
"Goebbels has made his customary appearance and even Al Quaeda (sorry, Phil) got a mention. "
You may regret the mention of the Spiritual Forebears of Ash and their Ilk but have you read The Jewel Thief's latest?
Not that a 'lone nut' shouting in the cultural intellectual wasteland that is the Daily Mail Comments Section bothers me but the fact that they saw fit to publish it does when they would normally censor such comments about any other group.
Simon, can you seriously deny that some of the more recent Posters/Ads of the Uber Righteous look and read like something "Leni" Riefenstahl could have dreamt up? Oh dear...there I go again mentioning with the 'nazi' names again...
As I have said many times, repeated references to a totalitarian regime that slaughtered six million Jews is inappropriate and embarrassing in relation to tobacco control. In terms of building support for our cause, it is entirely counter-productive.
However, this is not what this post is about so further comments on this subject will have to find another home. How about your blog – http://blockeddwarf.blogspot.co.uk/?
I would bet that the tobacco companies would love to engage with their consumers. Trouble is, they are obligated by law to not engage with you. They have very limited options to communicate to you here in the UK. They receive no support from the mainstream media in getting viewpoints out there. We should be grateful that at least some of the media get in touch with Simon, but they rarely give him more than a sentence in the paper, while the tobacco control gets dozens of paragraphs.
The problem is not the tobacco companies. And while I agree that consumer apathy is a problem, due to smokers be shamed for decades and not wanting to be "outed" as it were, the problem is really with the media not presenting the facts fairly or equally for both sides.
If you want to know what the tobacco companies are doing for you, visit their web sites, before even those are taken away.
I believe the reference to Nazis is relevant - to a point - due to Tobacco Control using the Nazi War on Smoking as a template for the war on smokers now.
We have long held up tyrannical tinpot jobsworths as such although we used to call them "Little Hitlers" - such as Blakey On the Buses who could be considered even less of a Nazi than TC.
However, I have to agree with Simon when you watch this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hLYavpMSFs&feature=fvwrel there is no comparison with what happened to the Jews and what is happening to smokers.
That said, TC does flirt with Nazi ideology. The Nazi Jew Mushroom that said "like a poison mushroom Jews can poison whole villages" was used and turned into a smoker in the BMJ to push the cause of SHS.
I don't think the wider general public sees the comparisons and I am sure that we won't be sent off to death camps any time soon so that in itself, I think, makes the Nazi reference a problem in trying to get the public to recognise that Denormalisation is wrong and it does lose us support.
Sorry Phil, but I also think that invoking Al Queda will do us more harm than good.
But exactly how are we meant to show Govt that its bullying of consumers has sinister echoes of times gone past and is making people very uncomfortable?
I wonder Simon, if there is any merit in trying to also secure funding from the Food and Drink industry given that their consumers are next on the Puritan hitlist.
I think it is more the anti science and propaganda methods of Tobacco control which are compared to those of totalitarian regimes - their concern for "the children" for just one example. Their opposition to the sale of snus isn't helpful, but nobody is seriously suggesting that we are going to be murdered by Tobacco Control. For one thing, with Googlemaps in operation it would now be extremely difficult to carry out mass murder. And who was it who started talking about passive smoking harm "deniers" ? It was the tobacco control industry - using a word which, in this context, has only ever been used in connection with the holocaust
This is truly a most wonderful initiative on behalf of Imperial Tobacco for their beleaguered travelling consumers - I never thought this could or would happen at the airports again.
I just hope Imperial, and other tobacco companies, will forgive me for accusing them of not supporting their customers.
Thank you Simon for bringing this to my/our attention.
That's fine as far as it goes but how often do most of us use an airport? Now all we need is for them to offer to do the same in selected pubs. Then I'll believe they're serious and have my support back.
Simon, as you have the ear of the tobacco companies, perhaps you could point them in the direction of this design for a smoking area / booth. It looks to be at concept stage at the moment, but with BT finance it could be made reality. It is really a cool design, and would put the antis' noses right out of joint! I would love to see these in airports, shopping malls, and anywhere else that smokers are excluded from. It would be a worthy addition to the "smoking allowed" portfolio.
I liked Jonathan Bagley's idea around demonstrating that smoke extraction works. When I visited a hotel in Egypt last year which had promised me that their main lounge was smoking-allowed, I was dismayed when I first walked in, because I could neither see nor smell any smoke, and I immediately assumed I'd been misled. It was only when I sat down and looked around me that I realised there were several people smoking at tables, to the inconvenience of absolutely no one. (I don't want to say which hotel it was publically because the chain "prides" itself on being totally smoke-free, and I wouldn't want to get this particular one into trouble!)
Have any of the tobacco companies ever worked together with extraction companies to conduct and publish this kind of research to your knowledge, Simon?
Need to get imperial tobacco to fund the construction of a pub that conforms to the law with regards to smoking.
On Christmas day 2011, I watched a programme at midday. I seem to remember that it was on Sky News, a bit like a 'Hard Talk' programme, with a seasonal edge.
The presenter was sat having a three course Christmas Dinner, (you could see the chef preparing the courses), with wine and a waitress. He was sharing the meal with three guests from British Industry. They were mainly discussing general topics from the year concerning the success/failure of industry.
At certain points, the presenter would ask a representative if there was anything particular to their own industry which they were unhappy about.
One of the guests was a director from Imperial Tobacco, I think it was Imperial Tobacco, a rather attractive young lady, so maybe you can confirm Simon.
Anyway, she responded by saying she was not happy about many aspects of Tobacco Control. Her main point was that the government are very hasty to push through legislation which is not very strongly evidence based.
As Frank Davis points out, if tobacco companies wanted to reach out to their consumers they wouldn't need expensive (and probably illegal) TV or radio advertising. A simple info card in each pack with details of consumer groups, websites, petition links etc would do the trick - it's a direct line to cigarette consumers. There are 15,000,000 smokers in this country and most of them STILL moan about the ban when you get talking to them in a new pub. But there is no organisation. Smokers are possibly the biggest "minority" group (certainly the most persecuted!) - it really wouldn't take a lot to mobilise them. Maybe not into protest marches, but certainly into signing petitions or being redirected to websites that send automated letters to their MP. If only 10% of consumers did this that would be 1.5 million emails or 2500 emails to each MP! Or the petition would go over the 100,000 signature threshold fifteenfold!
Just by putting a card in each packet of fags.
So why don't they?
They have already thought of that one, Mr A.
"There should be no advertising or promotion inside or attached to the package or on individual cigarettes or other tobacco products"
http://www.who.int/fctc/guidelines/article_13.pdf
I think that promoting petitions or letter writing campaigns would definitely count.
Don't forget that under Article 5.3 that our government seems so proud of observing to the letter.
"The measures recommended in these guidelines aim at protecting against interference not only by the tobacco industry but also, as appropriate, by organizations and individuals that work to further the interests of the tobacco industry."
http://www.who.int/fctc/guidelines/article_5_3.pdf
So any petitions asking them not to continue to treat people who smoke as contagious subhumans would be likely to be disregarded.
2005
Caroline Flint: - "Since publication of the Health Bill on 27 October 2005 there have been no formal discussions with the World Health Organisation (WHO) of part I of the Bill at either ministerial level or official level.
However, the content of the Bill is informed by the WHO International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classification of second-hand smoke as a human carcinogen in 2002. The United Kingdom has also, along with some 114 other countries, ratified the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). The WHO FCTC states:
Recognising that scientific evidence has unequivocally established that tobacco consumption and exposure to tobacco smoke cause death, disease and disability".
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmhansrd/vo051220/text/51220w15.htm
Stitched up like kippers.
Mr A, knowing the severe restrictions imposed on tobacco companies, I should imagine that they would not be allowed to. Fake charities can lobby as much as they like, but if anything smacked of the tobacco industry lobbying their consumers with regard to government legislation, they could face the wrath of Tobacco Control. I should imagine they have to trread very carefully.
Free country?
Like smokers, tobacco companies are on a hiding to nothing at the moment. Dr. Margaret Chan is the Head of the World Health Organization and Dr. Ruth (please don't write to me again, David) Malone who is one of Professor Stanton Glantz's lackies wrote this obsequious drivel in the BMJ's Tobacco Control Blog. "Director General Margaret Chan’s blazing speeches, urging governments to stand together against the tobacco industry, made repeated references to fighting the “despicable” industry." In the previous article she says: "An interesting challenge was issued at the plenary by Greg Connolly - he believes there is no need for WCTOH after 2030 as this must be our target date of ending the global tobacco epidemic. When countries like Indonesia have yet to join the game, can we really be talking about endgame scenarios in tobacco control?
I hope you can see what we are up against. The tobacco companies are damned if they do and damned if they don't. The post script on Indonesia is that the restrictions on tobacco have been scrapped. Before I give the quotes, I will say the sight of very under age children smoking in Indonesia horrible.
"In its current form, Ignatius said, the bill threatens the livelihood of tobacco farmers and tobacco industry workers. It calls for all public service spaces, such as schools and hospitals, to be smoke-free zones. It also requires that all cigarette packs carry graphic health warnings, and that the government gradually raise the tobacco excise tax. It also calls for a total ban on tobacco advertising and the establishment of clinics designed to cater to smokers wishing to kick the habit."
http://blogs.bmj.com/tc/
http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/health/indonesias-tobacco-bill-goes-up-in-smoke/509707
Just looking at that picture of the "Airside Smoking Balcony".
Am I right in thinking that what looks like pools of rain spread almost to the back wall?
If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, it must be a duck.
Antismokers?
Just transpose the word duck for Nazi.