One
Stop - New You - Right Now
Top court steps back into
tobacco-warning debate
Vancouver Sun February
19, 2007
Ottawa - Three big tobacco
companies will square off against the federal government today as
the Supreme Court of Canada considers whether graphic health warnings
on cigarette packages and restrictions on tobacco advertising are
constitutional.
The Supreme Court is stepping
back into the debate 12 years after it first ruled, by a tight 5-4
margin, that a total ban on advertising violated the freedom of
commercial expression rights of cigarette companies.
This time around, the
court will consider whether a redrawn law that severely restricts
smoking ads, crafted in response to Ottawa's 1995 loss in the top
court, is also unconstitutional.
The revamped Tobacco Act
is effectively an advertising ban that merely "pays lip service"to
the Supreme Court's call for a constructional law, lawyers for Imperial
Tobacco Canada Ltd., JTI-Macdonal Corp. and Rothmans, Benson and
Hedges Inc. argue in a written court submission.
The act, among other things,
restricted advertising to adult publications and establishments,
such as bars and magazines, and imposed a phased-in ban on sponsorship
at events.
The government, tobacco
companies and anti-smoking groups have been in and out of the courts
for two decades fighting over laws governing cigarette advertising
and whether a ban is constitutionally justified given that smoking
is a health hazard.
The Canadian Cancer Society,
which is intervening in the latest appeal, says times have changed
since the supreme Courts' last ruling and there is now a complete
advertising ban i most countries.
The three big tobacco
companies are also appealing federal regulations that force them
to print on cigarette packages graphic health warnings with color
photos.
The Canadian Cancer Society
says that lung caner is the leading cause of cancer death for both
men and women. Smoking is responsible for killing 45,000 people
annually, accounting for 30 per cent of all cancer deaths in Canada.
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