UK: Campaigners Welcome Tobacco Ads Ban

Source from:  Belfast Telegraph 04/17/2013

A second round of anti-plain packaging ads have been banned for making potentially misleading claims about the black market and unpaid duty.

National press ads placed by Japan Tobacco International (JTI), in response to the Government's plain packaging consultation, claimed that "the black market in tobacco is booming".
 
It also said standardising packs would make them easier to fake and cost taxpayers in unpaid duty. Cancer Research UK challenged both claims, saying they were unsubstantiated and misleading.

JTI, which had a different set of ads banned by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) last month for making false claims about government policy, said it was a well-established fact that the market in illicit goods was a major global problem and had grown significantly in size and value over the last 30 years.
 
It said HMRC figures from 2011, in a report entitled Measuring Tax Gaps, showed that the illicit tobacco trade already cost taxpayers up to £3 billion per year in lost revenues.

They provided examples of the £3 billion figure being quoted by public officials, including in a letter to the Home Secretary from MP Jim Sheridan and by the HMRC itself to emphasise the cost of the illicit tobacco trade to the tax payer.

Upholding the complaint, the ASA noted that the HMRC report stated that "the tobacco illicit market had been reduced significantly over the last decade".
 
It said: "Because we considered that consumers would understand the claim 'the black market in tobacco is booming' to mean that the problems with the tobacco illicit market had been increasing, when we understood that that was not the case, we concluded that the ads were likely to mislead."

Cancer Research UK's executive director of policy and information, Sarah Woolnough, said: "This welcome judgment highlights that yet more of Japan Tobacco's claims are misleading. The tobacco industry has focused its opposition to plain, standardised packs on a claim the illicit trade would increase. Independent experts have repeatedly said these claims do not make sense. Now an independent regulator has told JTI that its communications could not be substantiated."

JTI's head of corporate affairs in the UK, Paul Williams said: "Whilst we will not publish the advertisement in question again, we disagree with those who appear to wish to close down this debate by challenging the semantics of our statements rather than the substance. We will continue to express our concerns, as it is essential that common sense and sound evidence prevail." Enditem