Abstract
BackgroundWe reviewed the implementation of New Zealand laws in relation to the activities of the tobacco industry and their allies. Material for two brief case studies was obtained from correspondence with official agencies, official information requests, internet searches (tobacco industry documents and official government sites), and interviews with 12 key informants.ResultsThe first case study identified four occasions over a period of 14 years where New Zealand Government agencies appeared to fail to enforce consumer protection law, although apparent breaches by the tobacco industry and their allies had occurred in relation to statements on the relative safety of secondhand smoke. The second case study examined responses to a legal requirement for the tobacco industry to provide information on tobacco additives. There was failure to enforce the law, and a failure of the political process for at least 13 years to clarify and strengthen the law. Relevant factors in both these cases of 'policy slippage' appear to have been financial and opportunity costs of taking legal action, political difficulties and the fragmented nature of government structures.ConclusionConsidered together, these case studies suggest the need for governments to: (i) make better use of national consumer laws (with proper monitoring and enforcement) in relation to tobacco; and (ii) to strengthen international law and resources around tobacco-related consumer protection. A number of options for achieving these aims are available to governments.
Highlights
A number of authors argue that specific attention by governments and advocates to the policy implementation process is needed in tobacco control, to avoid the risk of 'policy slippage' [1,2,3]
The tobacco industry has demonstrated the importance of obscuring public knowledge of Secondhand smoke (SHS) harms by their investment in deception about it [18,19,20,21,22]
In 2000, the Minister of Health wrote to the Hospitality Association of New Zealand (HANZ), noting that 'It is extremely important to treat what is said about SHS ... with due caution
Summary
A number of authors argue that specific attention by governments and advocates to the policy implementation process is needed in tobacco control, to avoid the risk of 'policy slippage' [1,2,3]. We reviewed the implementation of New Zealand laws in relation to the activities of the tobacco industry and their allies. The programme operates in the context of the activity in New Zealand of three major international tobacco companies – British American Tobacco, Philip Morris, and Imperial Tobacco. The activities of such companies have been part of the impetus for the recent formation (and ratification by most countries) of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, the first treaty under the World Health Organization's treaty making powers
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