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Tobacco firms vow to fight on against plain packaging following High Court defeat

Two of the world’s biggest tobacco companies have vowed to continue to fight plain packaging in the UK, after the High Court today rejected a bid by the cigarette industry to prevent the introduction of the new law.

Plain packets of cigarettes will be officially imposed tomorrow after Mr Justice Green dismissed a challenge against the measure by four industry giants: British American Tobacco (BAT), Japan Tobacco International (JTI), Imperial Tobacco, and Philip Morris International (PMI).

BAT and JTI immediately said they would seek to appeal the ruling, which means that brands and logos will be banned and packets must be a standardised green-brown, with graphic health warnings. Tobacco companies have a year to sell through their old stock.

The cigarette-makers had argued that the controversial law deprived them of their intellectual property without receiving compensation. They also said the evidence from Australia, the first country in the world to impose plain packaging in December 2012, showed it had been ineffective in discouraging people from smoking.

However, in a ruling that ran to 386 pages, Mr Justice Green decided in favour of the Government, which seeks to cut smoking rates and stop children from picking up the habit.

“The regulations were lawful when they were promulgated by Parliament and they are lawful now in the light of the most uptodate evidence,” he said. “There is a significant moral angle which is embedded in the regulations which is about saving children from a lifetime of addiction, and children and adults from premature death and related suffering and disease.”

Deborah Arnott, the head of anti-smoking charity Ash, described the ruling as a “crushing defeat for the tobacco industry”.

But a spokesman for Dunhill manufacturer BAT claimed it was “by no means the final word on the lawfulness of plain packaging”, claiming the judgement “contains a number of fundamental errors of law”.

JTI, the other company that plans to appeal, said: “This decision sets a dangerous precedent for intellectual property rights and investment. Other consumer goods industries must now worry that their branding is under threat from political opportunism, rather than examining the evidence.”

Both Imperial and PMI said they were “disappointed” with the ruling.

It is a blow to the cigarette industry, which earlier this month also failed in an attempt to block new European Union rules that bans 10-packs and forces manufacturers to put health warnings on 65pc of packaging. The EU regulations also come into force tomorrow.

Debt rating agency Moody’s said tobacco companies should be able to mitigate plain packaging, but warned that measure “could reduce cigarette volumes and brand value over time, and there is also the risk that consumers could trade down to cheaper brands.”

Shares in BAT and Imperial, which are both listed in London, fell 1.9pc and 0.6pc respectively, although the latter was trading exdividend.

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