Plain packaging is pointless
Thursday, April 12, 2012 at 13:29 The Yorkshire Post published an article by me about plain packaging on Tuesday. It's not available online but you can download a pdf or read it here:
Simon Clark is director of the smokers’ group Forest which runs the Hands Off Our Packs campaign
To mark the Government’s launch of a public consultation on plain packaging of tobacco, we published a spoof story with the headline: “Easter eggs to be sold in plain packaging.”
We reported: “Public health campaigners want all seasonal confectionery to be sold in uniform beige packs which research has shown is the colour that is least appealing to children and the obese.”
It was a joke but not as far fetched as it sounds. Tobacco may be the number one target today but it’s only a matter of time before other products that are considered “unhealthy” are in the firing line.
Plain Packs Protect, the campaign that supports plain packaging of tobacco, denies this. Campaigners argue that “plain packs for tobacco will not set a precedent for other consumer products”. The very suggestion, they sniff, is a “myth”.
Really? The Government recently published its new Alcohol Strategy. This was followed by an announcement that the Commons Health Committee will hold an inquiry into the proposals.
The inquiry will examine “international evidence of the most effective interventions for reducing consumption of alcohol and evidence of any successful programmes to reduce harmful drinking”. This includes, wait for it, “plain packaging and marketing bans”. Not such a myth now, is it?
Meanwhile, what about plain packaging of tobacco? As the father of two teenagers, I can’t imagine anyone wanting children to smoke. Smoking should be restricted to adults who are old enough to make an informed choice about a potentially addictive habit that is associated with a number of serious illnesses. Any reasonable measure to discourage under-age smoking is welcome.
But plain packaging is not reasonable. To start with, there’s nothing plain about plain packaging. In Australia, which will become the first country in the world to put cigarettes in standard packs, cigarettes are to be sold in uniform packaging whose colour (drab green) has been chosen because research suggests that it is the colour that consumers find least attractive.
In addition to imposing a dull uniform colour on all packaging, graphic health warnings are to appear on both sides of the packet. Logos will disappear and brand names will be printed in a standard font. That’s not plain, that’s grotesque.
The argument that “glitzy”, colourful packaging encourages children to smoke is weak. For years, even anti-smoking campaigners agreed that the main reasons why teenagers smoke are peer pressure and the influence of family members who smoke. What’s changed?
The claim that dull standard packaging will reduce youth smoking rates is equally flawed. No good evidence exists because plain packaging has never been tried. At the very least, the Government should wait and see what impact it has in Australia.
After all, there are well-founded fears that plain packaging could have serious consequences for consumers and retailers if it fuels black market trade in illicit and counterfeit tobacco.
Meanwhile, there is the important matter of public money being used to influence the outcome of a government consultation. Freedom of Information requests have revealed that large sums of public money are being used to lobby the Government to introduce plain packaging in the UK.
Smokefree South West, a publicly-funded tobacco control group based in Bristol, has a current budget of £468,462 to run the Plain Packs Protect campaign. Since its launch, it has been promoting plain packaging online and through billboard advertisements that have sprung up all over the south west of England. It is scandalous that public money is being used to influence the result of a government consultation.
Ultimately, though, this debate is not about tobacco or the alleged misuse of taxpayers’ money, serious though that is. It is about excessive regulation and the infantilisation of society. If public health lobbyists get their way on this alcohol will follow tobacco as night follows day. After that it will be fast food and, yes, even confectionary.
Welcome to a brave new world in which personal choice and individual responsibility are replaced by government diktat imposed by unelected mandarins and supine politicians in Whitehall.
Now that’s plain stupid.
Reader Comments (4)
"Smokefree South West, a publicly-funded tobacco control group based in Bristol, has a current budget of £468,462 to run the Plain Packs Protect campaign. Since its launch, it has been promoting plain packaging online and through billboard advertisements that have sprung up all over the south west of England. It is scandalous that public money is being used to influence the result of a government consultation."
Indeed. But how can a billboard campaign influence the result - advertising impact is notoriously difficult to quantify? Unless, perhaps, you conduct a little survey on the pretense of evaluating the impact or, if you don't feel the need to be so subtle, advertising the means by which you can register your support for plain packaging.
TC bang on about 'glitzy' packaging and pretty pink packets shaped like lipsticks, designed to lure the female teen - but I've yet to see any on sale. I did ask a TC activist where these are available but she didn't reply.
I think I heard Arnott bemoan that young females smoke to keep their weight down, yet we have the same young girls being made acutely aware that obesity is verboten. I just hope that the various Righteous factions kill each other in the invevitable conflict of interests.
Meanwhile, what a pity that the tobacco companies can't make a donation to an anonymous blogger to organise a billboard campaign which counters that of Smokerfree Eurasia.
Simon,
All the stuff about 'glitzy' colours and children is a smokescreen. Their real intention is to get control of THE SIZE of the packets and thereby the size of the contents. Stephen Williams said so on his website. In fact, he even confirmed that intention in reply to a comment of mine. It easy to see how regulations could be made in the future which gradually reduce the size of cigarettes.
We should also note that all the directives so far have been aimed at manufacturers and suppliers. Individuals have not yet been attacked directly, apart from smoking in commercial vehicles, which, as far as I can see, has been a complete failure. My local hospital has several big notices saying, "This is a smoke-free site", but no one is taking any notice. It is not enforced. Patients come out in their dressing gowns and visitors stand around the main entrance smoking.
Thinking about Stony Stratford, what was that about? It was a direct attack upon individuals and was roundly trounced.
Mark Field MP has an excellent piece about plain packaging on conservativehome.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/platform/2012/04/mark-field-mp-plain-packaging-of-cigarettes-should-be-resisted-as-a-matter-of-principle-by-all-conse.html
I would like to know if cigarettes are to be sold in plain packages how on earth will one know what brand they are buying. How will the pricing get on when we are all buying the same package. This is the most ridiculous thing i have ever heard. The consumer should surely have the right to know exactly what they are buying.My friend went into asda and was asked by her friend to get her 20 cigarettes. As she approached the counter she forgot what brand it was and asked the young lad if she could look to recognise it and was told that would be more then his jobs worth to pull back the screen how bloody ridiculous is that needless to say my friend took her business else where. What the hell is my country comming to when people are treated like children by a dictatorship government. If cigarettes are sold in plain packages then surely there is no need to have the screens shut as children wont be enticed to buy cigarettes as they no longer would be in shiney colourful packages.( as the government keeps on saying.)