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“
Health
groups have welcomed a ban on the misleading and deceptive descriptors
“light” and “mild” on tobacco products but say the two
multi-national tobacco companies have been let off the hook with a
one-off total payment of $8m to remedy massive harm to consumers. The
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) announced late
today that it had resolved its lengthy investigation into misleading
tobacco branding (“light”, “mild” and all similar terms), with
a court enforceable undertaking from two of the three major tobacco
companies operating in Australia. The
misleading descriptors will be removed by mid 2005 but the companies,
BAT and Philip Morris, will only have to pay $4m each to fund consumer
education programs to remedy the harm caused by their unlawful
conduct. “Mass
media campaigns are expensive and experts estimate that $8m for
education programs will only go part of the way towards funding the
remedies that are necessary to reverse the harm caused by this
consumer fraud”, says Anne Jones of ASH Australia. Meanwhile,
light and mild cigarettes have made the tobacco industry millions of
dollars as most smokers rather than quitting, switched to lights
because they wrongly believed them to be less harmful. Health
experts estimate that a sustained campaign to counter the harm from
the lights scam, reducing the proportion of users believing they are
less harmful from 55% to 5%, would cost over twenty times the amount
accepted by the ACCC. The
third tobacco company – Imperial Tobacco Australia – is refusing
to agree to ACCC demands for banning the misleading terms or paying
for corrective advertising. Health
groups are seeking more information, including how the ACCC derived
such an inadequate estimate of $8m to counter the consumer fraud. ACCC
media release is at www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/607418/fromItemId/142 Comment: Anne
Jones, CEO, ASH Australia ph.
(02) 9334-1876 m.
0417-227-879 Media inquiries:
Stafford Sanders ph.
(02) 9334-1823 m.
0412-070-194
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Page last updated 13/5/05 |
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