Plain Paper Astroturf

Anne Davies in today's SMH comments that -

If your bulldust detector is twitching over outraged retailers warning that plain packaging for cigarettes "won't work, so why do it", you are right on the money.

The tobacco industry is not only funding the campaign being run by the Alliance of Australian Retailers to stop plain packaging being introduced, it is employing the public relations firm to run the campaign, approving who will do media interviews and managing the strategy for lobbying government.

Her generously-titled 'Big Tobacco hired public relations firm to lobby government' questions astroturfing by the cigarette industry in response to proposals for plain paper packaging of cancer sticks, highlighted earlier in this blog.

Davies suggests that Chris Argent (director of corporate affairs at Philip Morris) is controlling the advocacy campaign by the ostensibly independent Alliance of Australian Retailers -

down to approving who will do which interviews, approving the words to be used by the heads of the various retail organisations and approving email responses to journalists.

Philip Morris, rather than the Alliance, is paying for the multi-million dollar campaign, "as invoices and contracts of engagement show".

The Alliance's marketing adviser is reported as blithely commenting to the SMH that the Alliance had been upfront about funding from the tobacco industry: "This support includes the funding of professional services such as public relations".

Philip Morris Australia stated that

We are pleased to join with and support the efforts of corner shops, service stations and milk bars to stop implementation of this unproven policy which lacks any credible evidence that it will work. Our efforts with the Alliance will include ongoing financial support and public relations advice.

Support that involves the Alliance acting as a sock puppet raises questions about the credibility of the Alliance's statements and the legitimacy of its advocacy.

Those questions are significant, given the SMH's indication that the phase of the Philip Morris cum Alliance $9.37m advocacy campaign

will involve information packs and letters to all MPs in the coming weeks. Now that the minority government is confirmed, the group plans to step up a government and opposition relations strategy, to block the legislation.