Examination of Witnesses (Questions 680
- 692)
THURSDAY 20 JANUARY 2000
MR S CLARK,
MR D SWAN
AND MR
C OGDEN
680 Do I understand you to say that you are a
mouthpiece for the manufacturers? They told you not to deal with
health risks, therefore you do not.
(Mr Swan) We are employed as a trade
association to carry out the wishes of our member companies. It
would be a very strange trade association if it did not.
681 Is the answer to my question yes or no?
(Mr Swan) They do not require us to talk
on this matter.
682 So you do not.
(Mr Swan) Therefore we do not.
683 Mr Clark, you said right at the beginning
that by and large the arguments you get into do not deal with
the question of health. I noted you down as saying that. In your
memorandum to us, why is it that there is an entire section, section
4, which in effect deals with what you call disinformation about
how the Government can mislead the consumer, which in paragraph
after paragraph deals with scientific and medical aspects? How
do you square those two propositions?
(Mr Clark) I said from the very start
that we do not get involved in health issues if we can help it
because we are not experts on that topic. I was a bit surprised
when we originally received the invitation to take part in this
particular inquiry because it was clearly about health risks.
When I wrote back to the Clerk I said that we could not comment
on the health risks, we do not have that sort of expertise. I
noted that there was a reference, a sentence, to the Government's
role in consumer protection and I said that if you wanted us to,
we would submit a very brief memorandum about our views on how
far the Government should involve itself in consumer protection.
That is why most of the memorandum relates to advertising. The
only reason that particular section you are referring to is there,
is because obviously in interviews people do ask us about the
health issues. Our basic point is that we are not experts but
we do feel on occasion that the anti-smoking lobby either exaggerates
its case—we were talking about it earlier to do with passive
smoking and the use of statistics—
684 May I just interrupt? Do you consider the
Government to be what you call part of the anti-smoking lobby?
(Mr Clark) Yes, I do. One of the cases,
for example, is clearly on the question of the health risks of
smoking and cancers. One of the things we feel is that there is
such a witch hunt against smoking and tobacco products at the
moment that we often feel other factors are not taken into consideration.
This is not our view, it is views expressed by other people. We
simply try to make this case. We are not setting ourselves up
to be experts in any way at all. However, we do point out—I
am looking at a report in front of me here—that as many
as two thirds of cancer cases are linked to the type of food that
people eat. So diet is a major issue. We accept there are health
risks associated with smoking but diet is an important factor
as well. There has recently been publicity about the effect of
genes. Some people may, it is said—
685 Levi jeans?
(Mr Clark) Some people may have a cancer
gene and obviously a lot of research needs to go into this, but
smoking is not the only health issue which affects us today. Sometimes
we feel that the anti-smoking lobby ignores other factors. Lord
Stoddart of Swindon in 1997 asked the Government basically what
percentage of total annual deaths was represented by the number
of deaths from so-called smoking related diseases. That is what
is referred to in our memorandum. The reply we received back from
the Government was that it estimated 120,000 people died as a
result of smoking in the United Kingdom in 1995 and the diseases
attributed to smoking and used to estimate the total number of
deaths were ... and there were 16 different diseases associated
with smoking. All we try to point out is yes, there are smoking
related diseases but as I understand it, two thirds of deaths
in the UK every year can be attributed to smoking related diseases,
therefore clearly a lot of non-smokers, people who have never
smoked, are dying of so-called smoking related diseases. We just
think that is an interesting issue and maybe one which should
be looked into. People are dying of so-called smoking related
diseases who have never smoked and therefore that surely cannot
be blamed on tobacco. There are other factors involved such as
diet, perhaps genes. We are not experts. I cannot go any further
than that because I do not know enough about the subject but these
are issues which have been raised by other people and we feel
that it is worth making that point and that really was the purpose
of mentioning it in the memorandum.
686 Is it not part of your job to get out there
and obscure the facts so that people, consumers as you call them,
do not know what to believe, so they are likely to continue smoking?
Is that not part of your job?
(Mr Clark) No, not at all. Our job is
to say that we want as much information in front of people as
possible, so that people can make a decision on whether or not
they wish to continue smoking. We do feel that some of the information
which is put out about smoking is either an exaggeration or it
does not take into account other factors. We feel this is counterproductive.
It is actually causing a lot of people to switch off. It is referred
to as warning fatigue. It is something we must bear in mind. If
we are constantly lecturing people, if we create a very paternalistic
society, a lot of people will switch off and in fact the anti-smoking
message, or the health message, will be lost. Any judgement this
Committee comes to when it produces a report must take that into
account. Warning fatigue is a serious problem.
Chairman
687 The Committee in evidence has received a
document entitled "Gallaher/TMA Awareness of Communications
Ban Campaign", which was submitted to us by M&C Saatchi.
It is right at the end of the dossier. This document proposed
several activities to diminish the impact of a proposed advertising
ban, including "Undermine Jowell, position her as the Minister
of Bans". Obviously Tessa Jowell was until recently the Health
Minister responsible for smoking policy. Could you explain the
status of this document and what actions it prompted?
(Mr Swan) If the Clerk had told me it
came from M&C Saatchi it would have saved me a couple of phone
calls. It is not in fact a TMA document, and it was presented
to me as an anonymous document. The status, to cut to the matter,
is that I believe this to be a think piece, probably from Saatchi's
responding to a prompt from Gallaher. I could put this in context.
The TMA did undertake an information campaign in June 1997. Initially—and
you may well have received it; I do not know whether you bothered
to read it or watch the video—a video and booklet were presented
to many MPs and peers and it was entitled Advertising the Facts.
As our discussions with the new Government and the new Department
of Health Ministers progressed—and the possibility at that
stage was that we were expecting primary legislation which was
the route if we could not persuade that the voluntary agreement
route was infinitely to be preferred—it began to emerge
that possibly the ban on advertising might extend to promotional
activity. So in September we issued another booklet and companies
wrote out to all those smokers who were redeeming gifts to warn
them that it was possible that this activity might be banned by
the Government.
688 The long and short of it, in terms of an
answer to my question, is that this was not a Gallaher/TMA communication.
(Mr Swan) I am coming on to that.
689 Could you be brief?
(Mr Swan) Yes. I am sorry, but I have
had very little opportunity to talk.
690 I appreciate that. It is a brief session
and we are grateful for your contribution. Feel free to write
to us afterwards if you feel there are areas you have not had
chance to speak about.
(Mr Swan) In parallel with this straightforward
activity, member companies expressed the view that the effectiveness
of the campaign which we had undertaken could be enhanced if it
were backed by a main media campaign. We agreed that Gallaher
would talk to Saatchi to see whether they came up with any ideas.
I do not know—I am speculating—I believe this must
have been the response to the approach of Gallaher. It is an agency
think piece. What I will say is that we did actually see yet another
presentation from another agency and we used none of them.
691 This is something we could obviously put
to Saatchi because they are with us in the next session.
(Mr Swan) Is the status of the document
now clear?
Chairman: Not from my point of view but when
I read the transcript it might be.
Dr Stoate
692 In evidence earlier on you said that your
evidence was that between two and three people per 100,000 might
die of passive smoking. Would you put that in perspective in that
one in 100,000 people are murdered in this country therefore passive
smoking is three times as dangerous as being murdered? What would
you think about that?
(Mr Clark) One has to put it in perspective:
it is not a lot of people. It is as simple as that.
| 
