Day three of the Independent's investigation ('Big Tobacco Exposed') is a bit of a damp squib.
Yesterday we were promised some earth shattering revelations – "How the industry used front organisations to gain access to research".
What we got (Smoke and mirrors: how the tobacco industry hides behind lobbyists) was the 'news' that three companies – legal firm Clifford Chance and PR companies Bell Pottinger and Hume Brophy – had submitted Freedom of Information requests without revealing that their clients were, respectively, Imperial Tobacco, Philip Morris and the National Federation of Retail Newsagents (NFRN).
Does this make Bell Pottinger, Hume Brophy and Clifford Chance front organisations for Big Tobacco? Er, no.
Is the NFRN, which receives a small amount of income from the tobacco industry (representing less than five per cent of its total income), a front organisation? No.
Was anyone misled into thinking that Bell Pottinger, Hume Brophy and Clifford Chance wanted the information exclusively for themselves? Only if you are entirely ignorant of the way that PR companies and law firms operate.
The only other revelation in today's Independent (circulation 176,681 and falling) was the information that "right-of-centre libertarian group" Big Brother Watch had also made an FoI request on a tobacco-related issue and that Alex Deane, a director of Bell Pottinger, is a former director of Big Brother Watch.
Does this make Big Brother Watch a front organisation for Big Tobacco? Hardly.
What it demonstrates is that BBW, like a growing number of think tanks and pressure groups, is so concerned by the creeping erosion of civil liberties (represented very clearly by the tobacco control movement) that it wants to do something about it.
If that makes BBW a front organisation for Big Tobacco then an awful lot of groups (and people) are going to be tarred with the same brush.
Some, however, are only too happy to promote the fiction that we're all pawns of a multi-million pound tobacco industry.
PS. I should add that it was announced yesterday that Dan Hamilton is leaving Big Brother Watch at the end of next week to join – Bell Pottinger!
Conspiracy theorists will have a field day. I'm surprised that ASH, and the Independent, didn't mention it. Perhaps that was a step too far, even for tobacco control and their fellow travellers.
Update on Saturday, September 3, 2011 at 12:41 by
Simon Clark
The Scottish media is catching up with the Stirling University story, which the Independent described as an "exclusive" on Thursday despite the fact that the Sunday Herald ran it on July 17.
Just how low will tobacco firms go to prey on new victims? (Daily Record)
Battle of Stirling where freedom is not an option (The Herald)
As it happens, the most sensible response to this nonsense can be found on the Guardian website. Needless to say, it's not written by a Guardian journalist but by freedom of information campaigner Heather Brooke.
See: Freedom of information is for businesses too.
In the interests of openness and transparency, I must declare that Heather has spoken at two Free Society events, one in 2008, the other in 2010. Neither event was about tobacco but both events were supported, indirectly, by the tobacco industry.
Does that make Heather Brooke a front for Big Tobacco too?
Update on Saturday, September 3, 2011 at 15:53 by
Simon Clark
Via Belinda Cunnison a stunning article by Frank Davis in the guise of an open letter to Stirling University's Linda Bauld.
Pat Nurse isn't too happy either.
