Philip Morris Declares War on "Plain Packaging"

Plain and white cigarette packaging

In Australia starting from the first of July, all packs of cigarettes will be white and anonymous; besides the omnipresent health warning, only the name of the brand in standard letters will be printed on the plain background, according to a regulation introduced by Parliament.

Philip Morris promptly launched legal action against the government and declared “We would anticipate that the compensation would amount to billions", Philip Morris spokeswoman Anne Edwards told The Associated Press; this move ... would essentially amount to confiscation of our brand in Australia”. Australian Premier Gillard responded severely, “We’re not going to be intimidated by big tobacco’s tactics” and the minister of health Nicola Roxon added, “We won't be deterred by tobacco companies making threats or taking legal action." Read more »

Marlboro & Ferrari - Cigarettes for Dickheads… an Auto of Dickheads

Ferrari Testa Rossa incidenteFerrari has announced that it is extending its relationship of collaboration with Philip Morris to 2015. The automaker’s liaison with Marlboro continues in spite of the fact that six years ago the sponsorship of tobacco brands was prohibited. The wily cigarette makers don’t give in. Evidently the law is applicable to others, not to them. So, the official name of the team remains the Ferrari Marlboro Racing Stable -«Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro», unperturbed.

In the meantime, the joyful announcement is given publicity in all the world’s newspapers, and those who criticize it are doing them a further favor because they are just increasing the visibility of the sponsor. Read more »

"Legal Gambling" the Italian Way: Who is the "Mafia"?

Giuseppe Pisanu

Giuseppe Pisanu, President of the Anti-Mafia Commission, stated that in the gambling sector, every year, at least 50 billion euro are stolen from the State

Ten officials of the AAMS (Azienda Autonoma Monopoli di Stato – Autonomous State Monopolies Agency) of Palermo have been investigated by the DIA (Direzione Investigativa Antimafia – Antimafia Investigation Department) with charges of corruption compounded by Mafia association in exchange for privileges in the granting of licenses for some gaming houses.

Giuseppe Pisanu, president of the Antimafia Commisssion commented: “When we suggest a two-year financial package of 38 billion euro, public opinion starts to fibrillate, but when we show that only on gaming, criminal organizations pocket at least 50 billion euro a year, no one seems to care”.

Fine words. But who is Pisanu talking about? Some Palermo organization that has made money on gambling casinos in the city suburbs or the Atlantis World Group of the Caribbean island of St. Maarten, principal concessionaire on the entire Italian territory.

The group that has absconded with billions of euro of the Italian people from legal slot machines; the affair is run from Rome and leads to Gianfranco Fini, president of the House, the third most important position of the central government, and to his trusted henchman Amedeo Laboccetta? Read more »

China: Dictatorship of the Population of Smokers

Smoke famous name, ChinaWinston Churchill used to say: “If two people are smoking under a NO SMOKING sign, you fine them; if twenty people are smoking under a NO SMOKING sign, you ask them to move on; if two hundred people are smoking under a NO SMOKING sign, you remove the sign”.

China seems to be following Churchill’s advice: on the first of May, new regulations on smoking in public places came into effect, but the smokers, who here are 350 million, dictate the law and continue to smoke as before.

The Chinese National Office for Tobacco Control foresaw that smokers would probably not be afraid to light up their cigarettes wherever and whenever they wanted; the authorities expected that before seeing any results, decades would pass and massive sensitization campaigns would be needed. Yet in China laws are generally enforced with great vigor and convictions are common; for crimes like corruption, a person can be executed. Read more »

2011: Del Gizzo Defeats Visco, Big Tobacco Continues to Be the Boss

Stop ai ladri!In 2000, the Italian Minister of Finance Vicenzo Visco brought legal action against the ex-director general of the AAMS - the State Monopoly Agency - Ernesto Del Gizzo related to an interview published in the newspaper La Padania; the interview centered on the issue of tax evasion and smuggling of Philip Morris in Italy.

Today Del Gizzo was acquitted. In these eleven years, though his statements have been confirmed by sentences of the Court of Cassation, the Regional Court - TAR, the Council of State, the Constitutional Court and the European Union, the multinationals of cigarette production have taken over the entire national market and are continuing to steal. Read more »

Japan Tobacco: A Total Tax Evader, Gives Alms in Lombardy

Roberto Formigoni

Roberto Formigoni, president of the Lombardy Region

When one leaves an unpaid bill that would make the Guinness Book of Records, we would expect that someone would try to make him pay up, but, on the contrary…

The president to the Lombardy Region, Roberto Formigoni, in a touching ceremony, awarded a plaque to Pier Carlo Alessiani, director of Japan Tobacco Italia, for the company’s support to the elderly of Milan.

With profits that exceed 500%, Japan Tobacco succeeds in taking home the total sum without paying a euro of tax. This is because the business it declares in Italy is «Società di consulenza & pubbliche relazioni, ingrosso beni durevoli vari» (Consulting and public Relations Company, wholesale various durable goods). Why did Formigoni, instead of spitting in his face, as the popular Italian comic Totò would have done, feel the need to reward the CEO making Japan Tobacco look like a benevolent, meritorious company? Read more »

Italy: The Class Action against Big Tobacco Rejected

Game Over - Try Again

About 3.5 million citizens should have been awarded 3,000.00 euro each, for a total of 10.5 billion euro.

But on April 13th 2011, the XIII Section of the Civil Court of Rome declared inadmissible the class action proposed by the Codacons* against British American Tobacco Italia, in favor of the smokers of the cigarettes produced by that company.

This outcome was perfectly foreseeable; no bookmaker would have accepted bets on it. In fact, no one could imagine that in a country where the multinationals custom-make their own laws and are “exonerated” from paying taxes and couldn’t care less about court sentences, judges might have allowed a “class action” like this, as though we were in America… Read more »

Cigarette taxation: Putin vs. Medvedev

Dmitrij Anatolevic Medvedev & Vladimir Vladimirovic PutinRussian President Medvedev has proposed reducing taxes on company profits from the current 34% to the previous level of 26%. But Putin does not agree and has reminded him that the increase to 34% was necessary to sustain the retirement fund and to modernize the health system.

In Russia a pack of Marlboros costs a little more than one euro, giving the makers a profit that does not reach 500% as in Italy, and the leaders are discussing in public the portion of Big Tobacco’s profits that must go to taxes. Read more »

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