Some more information has emerged about the new review on plain packaging.
Last month the Department of Health announced that an independent review of standardised packaging for tobacco would be conducted by Sir Cyril Chantler, a paediatrician who is currently chairman of University College London Partners and non-executive chairman of the Quality and Clinical Risk Committee of NHS England.
According to the DH:
The review will be focused on the health impact and will report back by March. It will provide an independent view which will help the government make a decision on whether to go ahead with standardised tobacco packaging.
Yesterday Sir Cyril published a 'method statement'. The paragraph that interested me most reads:
My Review is not concerned with legal issues, such as competition, trade-marking and freedom of choice. Nor will it consider issues such as the overall economic impact of standardised packaging on tobacco producers, retailers or associated industries. Consistent with my Terms of Reference, I am concerned only with the public health effects of introducing standardised packaging and not with assessing the alternative means of tobacco control.
There is of course a strong argument to be made that plain packaging will encourage illicit trade that in turn will endanger the health of children to whom illicit cigarettes may be sold at a fraction of the normal retail price.
The overall message, however, seems to be: if you're a retailer or wholesaler, a design or packaging company whose business could go bust as a result of standardised packaging, Sir Cyril doesn't want to hear from you.
Nor does he want to concern himself with alternative and possibly better methods of reducing youth smoking rates.
I understand why. Sir Cyril's brief is the public health impact of standardised packaging. But it ignores the fact that plain packaging is not just about public health. There are other very serious issues involved.
Are we going to get a review of the evidence on the economic impact of standardised packaging? Or a wider review about what plain packaging says about our 'liberal', market-led economy?
Of course not.
Sir Cyril's 'method statement' is an open invitation to the public health/tobacco control lobby to pile in with the results of the latest child-centred focus groups that bear little or no relation to real life situations.
Meanwhile Sir Cyril has announced that:
In line with my Terms of Reference I am being supported by an independent secretariat. This consists of Tabitha Jay and Christopher Cox – permanent civil servants seconded from the Department of Health ...
Independent? Given what we know about the DH, I'll leave you to decide.
Click on the link to read the full Method Statement.