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Health groups call for 10p rise in price of cigarettes

21/02/2008

Health groups are calling on the government today to increase the price of tobacco and to clamp down on tobacco smuggling.

Campaigning charity Ash will meet with the exchequer secretary Angela Eagle on behalf of 22 health groups to press their concerns ahead of the forthcoming Budget.

Ash says the tax on tobacco should be at least 10p per pack above the rate of inflation.

It also wants the government to implement a revised anti-smuggling strategy with new targets and to sign up to agreements reached between other EU countries and two of the world's leading tobacco companies - Philip Morris International and Japan Tobacco International - which put the responsibility for reducing smuggling on the tobacco companies themselves.

The UK is currently the only EU country not to have signed the anti-smuggling agreements.

Ash will also discuss the government's policy on measuring counterfeit tobacco, as it claims the latest published estimate suggests that only a quarter of the illegal cigarette market consists of counterfeit product, yet the focus of attention has been on counterfeit trade.

"Now is the time for the government to build on the popularity of the smokefree legislation and demonstrate its ongoing commitment to reducing smoking by increasing tobacco taxes," said Ash director Deborah Arnott.

"Raising the price of tobacco is the single most important measure but this must be done hand in hand with effective anti-smuggling measures."