HL Deb 04 April 1963 vol 248 cc645-53
LORD TAYLOR.

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.

[The Question was as follows:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what progress has been made in their discussions with the Joint Censorship Committee of the Poster Advertising Industry on the display of Ministry of Health posters on smoking and lung cancer and whether they will publish their correspondence with the Committee.]

THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL AND MINISTER FOR SCIENCE (VISCOUNT HAILSHAM)

My Lords, I must apologise in advance to the House for the absolutely inordinate length of this reply, but I think noble Lords will see that it is probably the only course I could take. The House will recall that the noble Lord, Lord Francis-Williams, raised this matter in the House on December 17 last. On that occasion I disclaimed responsibility on the ground, which is correct, that Her Majesty's Government are not responsible for the decisions of the Joint Censorship Committee of the Poster Advertising Industry. However, on December 17 my noble friend, Lord Ferrers (who had been expected to answer Lord Francis-Williams's Question) received a letter from the secretary of the Committee, which he later handed to me as the Minister who had in fact replied. I think that the House is entitled to be informed of this letter, and of the related correspondence which I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT. However, with the permission of the House, I would desire to quote the correspondence with which I personally was concerned.

The letter to Lord Ferrers, which I received on December 17, was in these terms: Lord Luke has asked me to write you in connection with the Question set down for today in the name of Lord Francis-Williams concerning the Joint Censorship Committee of the poster advertising industry. He apologises for not writing you personally, and also for the fact that he is unable to be in the House today. I enclose a copy of an article which appeared in the August 1960 issue of Signs & Outdoor Advertising which sets out the history of the Committee, its terms of reference and its objects, which I hope will give you information to help in any reply you give to Lord Francis-Williams. As his Question refers to recent decisions of my Committee, I give below a few facts concerning them. 1. The Committee recently banned posters issued by the Sunday Citizen referring to a series of articles on Western Germany, the reasons for the ban being that they constituted an attack on a member of a Government, and were also calculated to wound the susceptibilities of foreign peoples. I must emphasise as strongly as I can that, despite allegations to the contrary, no pressure of any kind has been placed upon my Committee in regard to their decision. 2. The Committee has also recently banned three posters issued by the Ministry of Health concerning lung cancer. These all contained the statement that 'cigarettes cause lung cancer'. This is, in the opinion of my Committee, undue exaggeration. They appreciate that a great deal of evidence has been adduced to show there is a link between lung cancer and smoking but they are not aware that there is positive proof that cigarettes do cause lung cancer. They would be perfectly willing to display, as they have done in the past, posters stating that cigarettes may cause lung cancer, and naturally they would reconsider their recant decisions if and when positive evidence is forthcoming to substantiate the wording of the rejected posters. Here again, I must point out that no outside pressure of any kind has been brought to bear to influence my Committee in its decision. One final point which I wish to stress is that the decisions of my Committee apply only to sites owned or controlled by members of the constituent Associations. I shall be pleased to give any further information you may wish to have on the matter. My Lords, I replied as follows on December 19: Lord Ferrers handed me your letter to him, since, as matters turned out, it fell to me to answer Lord Francis-Williams' Question. You write that you have knowingly prevented the Minister of Health from communicating the findings of scientific opinion to the public because 'there is no positive proof that cigarettes do cause lung cancer'. Yet your terms of reference do not, I note, include the assessment of scientific evidence. Nor am I aware of any qualifications you possess which would enable you to do so. On the other hand a number of scientifically qualified bodies support the Ministry of Health in their opinion that cigarette smoking is a cause of lung cancer. These include the Medical Research Council, the Royal College of Physicians, the National Cancer Research Institute of Canada, Netherlands Ministry of Social Affairs and Public Health, the United States Study Group on Smoking and Health, the United States Public Health Service and the World Health Organisation. I know of no scientifically qualified body which has come to a contrary conclusion. What constitutes positive proof is a matter of opinion, but in my judgment, to deny a public health authority the right to inform the public of an overwhelming scientific opinion is to be guilty of a grave public disservice. Your decision, and the responsibility it entails, must be judged against two facts: about £l1 million a year is, I believe, spent on advertising cigarettes and other smoking and the expenditure is rising: some 25,000 people die every year from lung cancer and the deaths from this cause are rising. Unless I hear from you to the contrary I propose to send copies of this exchange of letters to the press. To that letter, I received a reply on January 3: Your letter of the 19th December was considered by my Committee today. I am directed to say that they are as anxious as anyone to do everything possible to cut the lung cancer mortality rate. However, they cannot ignore certain long established rules about advertisement copy and design which are adhered to by all media owners. In effect, these rules bar copy which is exaggerated or calculated to induce fear. They feel sure that the Ministry of Health and/or their advertising agents must be unaware of these rules or have not interpreted them correctly. My Committee maintain that the phrase 'Cigarettes cause lung cancer' is too sweeping and may cause undue alarm. They have to bear in mind that untold millions smoked cigarettes for a great many years before the incidence of lung cancer reached its present proportions; that all the sufferers from this disease have not been smokers and that the word 'cigarettes ' used as it is could be taken to mean as few in number as two. It is noteworthy that the statement has not, so far as my Committee are aware, appeared as an advertisement in the Press or any other medium and that even the Minister of Health himself is not prepared to say more than that 'there is a close causal connection between the smoking of cigarettes and the incidence of lung cancer'. Had the posters contained the statement made in your letter and also in the Report of the Royal College of Physicians that 'cigarette smoking is a cause of lung cancer' they would have been accepted without question. The Industry has displayed many posters in the past for this campaign including the last series issued by the Ministry in April, and it will always be willing to co-operate in the future provided the posters are based upon the evidence which has so far been adduced. If they can assist the Ministry of Health with the lay-out in order to make it as effective as that just refused they will be very pleased to do so. The Committee ask me to say that they consider that the Outdoor Advertising Industry has been pilloried most unjustly in this matter through maintaining a principle common to all media, including the Press, and I have been asked to refer your letter to the Advertising Association for consideration by the Advertising Standards Authority. Finally my Committee would welcome the publication of the correspondence between us in all the Press but they would ask that the letters also are published which have passed between them and the Ministry of Health on the matter. My Lords, in turn I replied on January 11: Thank you for your letter of 3rd January. I note that your Committee find a significant difference between the proposition Cigarettes cause lung cancer' and 'Cigarette smoking is a cause of lung cancer'. I do not propose to argue the point but simply take you at your word. I have informed my colleague of your assurance and his officials will be getting in touch with you. In the meantime I will await the outcome before taking any further steps. After a meeting with officials and further correspondence, I came to the conclusion that no further use would be served by further delay and that the correspondence should be published. While I deplore the decision of the Committee, I should make it clear that the effectiveness of the Government's Health Education Campaign will not appreciably be affected by it. The Committee's objections relate only to a few of the Government's numerous posters, which are not in any case primarily designed for display on hoardings. In any case, I cannot think that the Committee will find it possible to remain indefinitely in what is a hopelessly indefensible position.

3.3 p.m.

LORD TAYLOR

My Lords, I thank the Lord President for that very long Answer, and I hope that the House will be indulgent if I ask more than one supplementary. First of all, may I ask him: have any other media been approached and refused to give this kind of publicity? I have in mind the daily and magazine Press and the television, all of which carry very substantial volumes of cigarette advertising and all of which are responsible media through which this warning should be conveyed.

Secondly, has a poster of the kind to which the Censorship Committee does not object now been prepared and been submitted to them, and are there any further troubles in connection with it? I personally see no objection to saying that "Cigarettes are a cause of lung cancer". They undoubtedly are, and we ought to get the message over, particularly if all the references are given and the authorities stated.

Thirdly, may one express an opinion that this is the strangest use of censorship that one has ever come across? One can understand censorship in respect of indecent screen advertisements, of which I notice a number seem to slip by this Board. Yet when it comes to informing the public of something which is a well-recognised fact, they seem to jib at it, for reasons, as the Lord President made quite clear, which are clearly financial. If they are prepared to advertise the rival merits of two kinds of detergents, surely it is equally reasonable that they should be prepared to advertise the merits and demerits of smoking. I cannot see that this is a moral issue they are standing on. It seems to be purely financial and quite a wrong way to exercise censorship.

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, in answer to the last part of the question, I entirely agree with the noble Lord. It seems to me to be absolutely indefensible and indeed irresponsible, illogical quibbling, and a quite ridiculous position that this body has taken up. I can only hope that public opinion will say so, too, and that they will see that they must in the end recede from an attempt to assume it. I personally also agree with the second part of his supplementary. I do not myself see any significant difference at all between the words which they said they will allow and those which they said they would reject. I think there is neither a scientific nor logical difference. I regard it as a mere quibble. I will bring the noble Lord's suggestion to the notice of my right honourable friend, though I should be rather reluctant to see him have his advertising media dictated to him, even in that form, by this Committee. I think that no other media have been approached for this purpose and have refused, because my right honourable friend's campaign was, I believe, a poster campaign. However, I will confirm that, and let the noble Lord know if that is not correct.

BARONESS SUMMERSKILL

My Lords, as what the noble Viscount has told us debases the standards of the advertising world, could he say whether there is any precedent for advertisers in any field to ignore the policy of a Government Department and, indeed, deliberately to reject it?

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, I know of no precedent in this field; but, of course, what is done is rather more serious than that. I suppose that it is free to anybody in this country to ignore the policy of Government Departments within the law, but this body has presumed to dictate to my right honourable friend even his ability to communicate his own official opinion to the public.

THE EARL OF ARRAN

My Lords, is the noble Leader aware that the great and good effects brought about by the Report of the Royal College of Physicians and the subsequent debate in your Lordships' House have almost entirely been negatived and destroyed by the massive advertising campaign of the tobacco companies subsequent to that Report and to your Lordships' debate?

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, I am not sure that that is quite right, although I appreciate what my noble friend has in mind. What is really disheartening is the apathy of the public towards this question. For instance, in this House we spent a whole afternoon two weeks ago discussing whether DDT, which is only ingested in minute quantities, could conceivably cause cancer, and more than one noble Lord expressed the view that nothing which could conceivably cause cancer should be allowed to be put on the market in any form at all. Yet here we are losing 25,000 lives a year through the gulping in of great masses of smoke from cigarettes, and nobody seems to care.

LORD HAWKE

My Lords, as the Minister is going to tell us what causes various diseases, will be start a campaign against the over-indulgence in food, which kills at least as many people a year as lung cancer?

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, I do not know. I think as a matter of fact that my right honourable friend's Health campaign does include a warning about over-indulgence in food, and certain other things too.

LORD TAYLOR

My Lords, is it not a fact that really a simple rule is moderation in all things, even including smoking; and if we can get people down to below 20 cigarettes a day we shall have done a lot of good. It is the people who smoke 30 or 40 a day who are so terrible; but I fear that in order to get rid of this scourge we shall have to get rid of tobacco altogether.

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

I think we should be making a great advance if we stopped excessive smoking. The evidence which the Royal College of Physicians accepted was that any smoking of cigarettes could be shown to bear a relationship to deaths from lung cancer. Of course, the issue here raised is not whether people should be free or not free; the issue is whether my right honourable friend should be allowed to express an opinion that they might die as a result of it.

LORD TAYLOR

My Lords, may I strongly urge that the Government should try out these other media as well? if cigarette manufacturers find it worthwhile to advertise on television and in the Press and magazines, surely it must be equally worthwhile for the Government to approach particularly the young people through these very media in order to give them a warning they should have.

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, I absolutely agree that these things must not be excluded; but I feel that a competitive shouting campaign, so to speak, between the Government and the commercial advertisers might be counterproductive. We have to approach this matter in an intelligent way, and we have, of course, available to ourselves certain media and certain methods of approach which are not open to the commercial advertiser and which may, in the end, prove to be more beneficial.

LORD CONESFORD

My Lords, will my noble friend take this into consideration? If the medical fact is as stated by the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, that moderate smoking is not likely to cause lung cancer—I am not saying that the Joint Censorship Committee are right; I regret that they refused this poster—is it not a possible view for an honest man to hold that "Cigarettes cause lung cancer" means they always cause it, whereas the statement "Cigarettes are a cause of lung cancer" is not open to that objection? And may I ask whether another suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, would not be a very good idea: that they should make that simple modification in the advertisement and resubmit it?

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, I do not altogether take the same view. One of the most effective posters to stop road accidents was, "Carelessness causes accidents". Nobody knows more clearly than the noble Lord that carelessness does not always cause accidents. To say from any rational point of view that that poster ought to have been redrafted like a legal document to say, "Carelessness is a cause of road accidents" seems to be reducing advertising to pure idiocy.

LORD TAYLOR

Would it not be equally logical to say that Daz or another detergent always washes whiter than every other one, which would be complete nonsense?

LORD REA

My Lords, I think the noble Viscount said in his first letter that not all sufferers from lung cancer were smokers. I do not take that to mean that an analysis was made and it was proved that no case of a smoker ever had lung cancer, but quite the reverse.

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, I am not sure what the noble Lord is putting. I never suggested—I certainly did not mean to suggest and I do not think I did suggest—that all those who had lung cancer were, in fact, cigarette smokers. This is certainly not true, as we made clear in our debate a year ago. What is true is that the incidence of lung cancer can be shown to bear a definite relationship to the smoking of cigarettes.

Following is the correspondence referred to in Lord Hailsham's Answer:

Ministry of Health,

Alexander Fleming House.

22nd November, 1962.

DEAR SIR,

Smoking and Health: Ministry Posters

It has been reported to us by a local authority in London that the display of Ministry posters on this subject has been refused by your organisation on spaces controlled by it.

These posters, which in the public interest give some of the main facts about the dangers to health of smoking, are official Government posters issued by the Ministry of Health, following the publication in March this year of the report of the Royal College of Physicians on Smoking and Health. I should, therefore, be glad to know the grounds on which the decision to refuse their display was taken.

Yours faithfully,

(Signed) S. A. HEALD,

Public Relations Officer.

H. M. Mallatratt, Esq.,

Secretary,

London Poster Advertising Association,

48, Russell Square,

London, W.C.1.