This morning I tweeted a link to a report that appeared on the BBC News website overnight.
If anyone is in mourning, however, it’s the BBC.
When it was reported, in December 2021, that the Labour government in New Zealand wanted to ban the sale of tobacco to anyone born after 2008, I noted that:
Forest’s reaction was reported by the digital Daily Express and MailOnline and I was also interviewed by Julia Hartley-Brewer on Talk Radio, Patrick Christys and Mercy Muroki on GB News, and Darren Adam on LBC.
The glaring omission on that list is the BBC.
See: Balance and the BBC (Taking Liberties)
Two weeks ago, when the incoming centre-right government in New Zealand announced that, as part of the new coalition agreement, it would repeal the policy, the BBC sniffily ignored the news for three whole days.
When the BBC News website finally got round to acknowledging the story, it led with the views of ‘health experts’ - who were inevitably incensed by the decision - and ignored the many voices who supported it.
See: New Zealand smoking ban: Health experts criticise new government's shock reversal (BBC News)
This is important because what’s happening in New Zealand, where the idea for a generational sales ban originated, is clearly of enormous relevance to the UK where the Government has only recently closed a public consultation on the issue.
Now, two weeks later, the BBC is using the highly emotive word ‘mourn’ to describe the reaction of an entire race of people, many of whom may actually welcome the incoming government’s more liberal approach to tobacco control.
What is missing, once again, is any semblance of balance, but I’m not sure the BBC cares anymore.
Here, for example, is what I wrote in 2021 when Forest took Five Live presenter Nihal Arthanayake to task for interviewing only Hazel Cheeseman of ASH when the New Zealand ban was first announced:
What is depressing is that a leading presenter on a national BBC radio station appears to have set himself up as judge and jury on smoking and won’t acknowledge that a discussion on the subject is rather more complicated and nuanced that the bald statement that 'around 78,000 people in the UK die from smoking'.
It’s as if he has listened to one side (the prosecution) and decided that whatever case the defence might have it’s not worth listening to because the prosecution has already won the argument.
Indeed, if I understand him correctly (he may wish to correct me), Arthanayake seems to think that the health risks of smoking are so great that they outweigh any debate or discussion that might (shock, horror) offer a more positive/alternative view of smoking.
As readers know, Forest has never encouraged anyone to start smoking and we fully acknowledge the health risks associated with the habit.
Nevertheless we cling to the old-fashioned view that, in a liberal and mature society, the ability to make informed choices and take responsibility for our own health - especially when it involves known risk factors such as diet, alcohol and combustible tobacco - are principles worth fighting for, and discussing.
I’m not sure the BBC agrees, which is annoying because they are happy to demand from millions of people an annual licence fee, but they seem increasingly unwilling to broadcast or publish views that are entirely mainstream and, in this instance, supported by 58 per cent of the adult population in Britain.
