IMPERIAL, Gallagher, Rothmans and British American Tobacco (BAT), the four biggest tobacco companies in the UK, will challenge a report from a government advisory committee that recommends a ban on tobacco advertising and smoking in public places. On July 6, the companies got permission from a high court judge in London to launch a legal challenge to the report. While permitting a judicial review of the work of the Scientific Committee on Tobacco and Health, the judge ruled that it had failed to consult the industry before publishing its report. The case is expected to be heard in three months.

The judge said the committee's findings were potentially damaging to the tobacco companies and appeared to attack their commercial morality, adding that the report lacked scientific rigour because it had made potentially damaging remarks about the companies without any comments on the reliability or independence of the source of comments. Lawyers representing the tobacco companies had argued that the report had been damming. They picked on the inclusion of a remark made by a marketing manager for the pharmaceutical company Wellcome saying that the industry "deliberately set out to recruit I new smokers to replace the ones we have killed".

The industry was happy with the ruling. "We hope the government resists any temptation to base tobacco policy on this flawed report," said Chris Proctor, head of science and regulation at BAT. The government's tobacco policy, to be announced later this year, is expected to be based on the evidence in the report of the advisory committee. It will be interesting to see the impact of the ruling on the government's formulation of policy. UK's department of health said that except for the narrow margin of the committee's failure to consult, the tobacco industry had lost all arguments. The department stated: "It should be noted that the decision to grant leave (for the judicial review) does not impugn the accuracy of the committee's conclusions. It merely reflects the fact that, on one particular aspect, its procedures may have been open to criticism."

The medical community and anti-smoking campaigners have also rejected the industry's arguments. Bill O'Niell, science advisor to the British Medical Association, accused the tobacco industry of "pure posturing". He explained that the industry refused to disclose information, though it had every opportunity to publish any information. "Why should anyone be interested in what BAT, Gallagher and Imperial have to say about passive smoking, advertising or anything else when they still will not admit that smoking causes lung cancer or that nicotine is addictive?" asked Clive Bates of Action on Smoking and Health, accusing the companies of denying the obvious.