The strange case of Rudolph, a Green community website, and Forest

The Chancellor has already said that he intends to increase tobacco taxation by inflation plus two percent (the so-called tobacco escalator).

Not content with this, the tobacco control industry wants the price of tobacco to go up by five per cent above inflation (ie 2p per cigarette).

The last Chancellor to do that was Gordon Brown and he jumped off the escalator like a scalded cat when he saw how much money the Treasury was losing to smugglers, counterfeiters and cross-channel shoppers (about £3 billion a year).

Yesterday BBC News ran this story: Budget 2012: Calls for '2p a cigarette' rise. It concluded with a quote from me.

However, Simon Clark, from Forest, the smokers' lobby group, said that a 5% increase above inflation would produce an "economic madhouse", and cause an explosion in smuggled and counterfeit cigarettes.

He said: "Ideally we'd like to see a reduction in duty, but the next best thing would be a freeze on tobacco duty, so that's what we're hoping for."

In response, I assume, to that somewhat bland comment, a petition has been posted on a Green community website calling on HM Government to Prosecute Simon Clark and FOREST for threatening to take criminal action to undermine the law of the [land]. It reads:

FOREST (the smoking junkies "rights" group") have implicitly said they will support people who turn to smuggling if tobacco price duty is raised (to help pay for the health costs incurred from their nasty little habit.) Remember it is not just direct smokers who suffer but secondary smokers who get the benefit of - for example - their parents habit. Smuggling is a serious criminal offence. Potential smugglers, amateur or professional, should bear this in mind before doing so and risking several years in jail.

The petitioner, Rudolf Affolter (?!), adds:

I have really said it all in creating this petition but I wish to reiterate that Simon Clark is implicitly urging smokers to take part in criminal activity; and that is in itself a criminal offence.

I'm not sure that warning government of the counter-productive effect of increasing taxation is the same as "urging smokers to take part in criminal activity", but tobacco control activists (even the sane ones) are hardly renowned for sticking to the facts.

Anyway, according to his profile Rudolf is "Green, pacifist, humanist, human rights activist, extreme Left-wing (in genuine sense)". He is a vegan and is politically "very liberal". He is also "loving, caring and compassionate".

As I write the petition has attracted the support of two people, one of whom is Rudolph. Watch this space.

Brief encounter

Mobile phone rings:

"Hello."

"Is that Simon Clark of the smokers' group Forest?"

"It is."

"I've been trying to get hold of you. I'm a smoker. Where is your office?"

"I'm sorry?"

"Where is your office?"

"Who are you?"

"I'm a journalist."

"Who do you work for?"

"I'm a freelance journalist."

"Are you calling as a smoker or as a journalist?"

"I'm asking the questions. So you won't tell me where your office is? Is it in London?"

Freelance journalist? My arse!

Campaign off to "rousing start"

Tobacco Reporter has a nice piece about the Hands Off Our Packs launch party on Monday night.

The Hands Off Our Packs campaign got off to a rousing start in London [this week].

Angela Harbutt, who is leading the Forest-managed campaign aimed at countering attempts at importing 'plain packaging' legislation from Australia to the UK, told an audience of about 150 people that she believed the proposal was the most ill-conceived, idiotic and illiberal idea that had come out of any UK government during the past five or 10 years.

She said that it was a fight that had to be won, and she asked those present to sign up to the campaign and to spread the word.

The campaign's website is at www.handsoffourpacks.com; there is a Hands Off Our Packs Facebook page, and the campaign can be followed on Twitter at @NoToPlainPacks.

The launch was addressed also by Christopher Snowdon, the author of Plain packaging: Commercial expression, anti-smoking extremism and the risks of hyper-regulation, which was published recently by the Adam Smith Institute.

Snowdon described the plain packaging proposal as one that even among the "intensive care contingent" of the anti-smoking movement was thought to be unmentionable five years ago.

Finally Mark Littlewood, the director general of the Institute of Economic Affairs, reminded the UK's top politicians of their commitments to reducing the burden of unnecessary regulations.

He told an appreciative audience that, in the early days of the present coalition, Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister, had launched his Your Freedom website and encouraged people to have their say. "You can sure count on that Nick..." Littlewood said.

And he said that David Cameron, the prime minister, could make a start to his commitment to tackle regulation with vigor by calling a halt to bringing in any more pointless, ludicrous, expensive and nannying rules.

See: Rousing start to anti-plain packaging campaign

I don't want to stigmatise smokers says MP who wants to ban smoking in cars with children

Lively discussion on Five Live last night but shorter than planned because of other breaking news stories.

It followed the publication of a report by a Department of Health adviser. Dr Hilary Graham found that Anti-smoking campaigns turn those who light up 'into lepers' (Daily Mail).

We've been saying this for years ("smokers treated like second class citizens" etc etc) but it's good to have it confirmed in an 'official' document.

Anyway, Five Live put me up against Alex Cunningham, the MP for Stockton North who has been trying to introduce a bill to ban smoking in cars with children. Cunningham sounded decent enough. His view is that there is no benefit in stigmatising smokers. He said he wants to take people with him but imposing an unnecessary law on smokers (the vast majority of whom don't light up in a car with children present) is not the action of a man who believes in consensus.

I was a bit bolshier than I intended to be but it was late (almost midnight) and I was tired. The gist of my argument was that intolerance towards smokers is increasing and I quoted some of the comments in response to the story about Dr Graham's report: "Smokers disgust me", "Smokers are disgusting and dirty outcasts", "Poor, sad nicotine addicts" etc etc.

I also mentioned that someone has posted on the Forest website the comment "I hope you die of cancer". This, I said, was the same comment that was directed at us by a Bristol councillor when we sent a mailshot to 18,000 councillors a few years ago.

My main point however was that while these comments do not (in my view) represent the majority of non-smokers, the intolerance they represent is being driven by the tobacco control industry and fuelled by government and politicians like Alex Cunningham.

I mentioned, as an example of scaremongering, the government's claim that 11,000 non-smokers were dying every year as a result of passive smoking. I also mentioned the campaign, funded with public money, that featured the slogan 'If you smoke you stink'. If that's not designed to whip up intolerance I don't know what is.

Pat Nurse came on after Cunningham and I had finished our spat and did a great job – the sane, moderate voice of the consumer!

You can listen here. It begins at 1:19:10.

Update on Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 9:37 by Simon Clark

According to Dr Graham's report:

The history of public health is scarred by policies which, pursued in the name of health protection and promotion, have served to intensify public vilification and state-sanctioned discrimination against already disadvantaged groups.

However:

She praised the success of anti-smoking policies which mean around one in five Britons is now a smoker, against four out of five in the 1950s.

That's the problem. Policies that stigmatise the consumer are considered a success if they reduce consumption rates.

Hands Off Our Packs - launch party

Hands Off Our Packs campaigners Amul Pandya and Angela Harbutt

Well, that went pretty well.

A full house (150 guests) celebrated, if that's the word, the launch of Forest's Hands Off Our Packs campaign at St Stephen's Club in Westminster last night.

The trade press was particularly well represented. Other journalists included the Daily Mail's Tom Utley, Simon Hills of The Times and Mick Hume, founding editor of Spiked.

There were one or two MPs, several parliamentary researchers, plus numerous think tank types including Eamonn Butler and Tom Clougherty (Adam Smith Institute), Matthew Elliott (Taxpayers' Alliance), Shane Frith (New Direction), Donna Edmunds (Progressive Vision) and Patrick Hayes (Institute of Ideas).

Bloggers were represented by Paul Staines and Harry Cole (Guido Fawkes), Dick Puddlecote and Chris Snowdon, among others.

Chris was one of two guest speakers, the other being Mark Littlewood, director-general of the Institute of Economic Affairs.

We also premiered a new campaign video, 'Welcome to Nanny Town', featuring contributions from Mark, Angela Harbutt and others.

More to follow.

Below: label on the bottle reads, 'WARNING! Alcohol can cause death, poisoning, cancer and addiction'.

Invitation to a party

Join us for the official launch of Forest's Hands Off Our Packs! campaign.

Date: Monday February 27, 2012
Time: 6.30-8.30pm
Venue: St Stephens Club, 34 Queen Anne's Gate, London SW1

There will be drinks, special guests and (brief!) speeches from the likes of Mark Littlewood, director-general, Institute of Economic Affairs, and Chris Snowdon, who wrote the well-publicised ASI report on plain packaging published on Monday.

It's invitation only but if you support the Hands Off Our Packs campaign (and have signed up) you are hereby invited to attend.

RSVPs to Nicky on 01223 370156 or email contact@handsoffourpacks.com.

Tobacco Control: soft, strong and very funny

I'm rather busy today but not too busy to recommend that you read this exceptional post by Chris Snowdon:

Humorous magazine celebrates 20th anniversary

Essential reading for journalists, broadcasters and, yes, politicians everywhere.

More statistical trickery?

More on plain packaging:

Cancer Research UK claims that "around 157,000 children aged 11-15 start smoking every year - that’s enough to fill 5,200 classrooms or make up nearly 14,000 junior football teams".

In a press release issued yesterday (for today), Jean King, CRUK's director of tobacco control, said:

“Our research has shown that selling all cigarettes in standardised packs will help reduce the appeal of smoking and give children one less reason to start smoking.”

But wait. Look again at those "start smoking" figures. According to CRUK:

The “started smoking” figure is calculated by comparing the smoking rates at each age with the smoking rates of the same group in the year before.

There were an additional 2 per cent smokers in 2010 than 2009 (regular smokers from 1 per cent to 3 per cent) but in addition 2 per cent of the 12 year old smokers in 2009 gave up (used to smoke up from 2 per cent to 4 per cent) so an equivalent number of smokers must have started (or else the 2 per cent smokers giving up and starting would cancel each other out) so there are actually 4 per cent new children smoking.

The four per cent is applied to the UK population to give a number of new children age 13 who start smoking in the UK. This is repeated for the other age groups and the totals added to give a figure for the number of new children.

Previous research has only been done for England and on the number of children who try smoking for the first time.

So 13 year olds in 2010 are compared with 12 year olds in 2009. Both regular – one or more cigarette per week – and occasional smokers – less than one cigarette per week – are included ...

Well, that's clear. Not.

For the record Forest released a brief statement in response to CRUK's press release. We said:

"There is very little evidence to suggest that children are encouraged to smoke by the sight of a branded packet. Children start smoking for many reasons but it is mostly due to peer pressure and the influence of family members.

"Plain packaging could be counter-productive. Counterfeit cigarettes are a big problem in Britain and standardised packs will make life much easier for criminal gangs who don't care who they sell to, adults or children.

"Instead of introducing yet another law that will hit retailers and adult consumers, the government should enforce laws that already exist and crack down on those who sell cigarettes to children."

I understand we were quoted on ITV's Daybreak but that's about it. Not for the first time the press (and the Press Association) chose to run a tobacco control story without a single balancing comment.

Fancy that!