Monbiot on university funding

Further to a recent blog post (scroll down for the relevant quote), this article from George Monbiot has popped up in the Guardian concerning the ability of corporations to fund university research.

Many of the comments on this piece, seem to miss his point, accusing Monbiot of wanting to live in a cave because he doesn't like Shell, whereas the argument seems to be more about whether corporate funding comes with strings attached. Not just Shell: the argument extends to any other industry that finances university education.

His point that universities don't accept tobacco funding is pertinent too: he cannot persuade universities to explain the difference between Shell and Philip Morris. The general public seems to be expected to accept that only big tobacco unduly influences government and so only big tobacco must be maligned – because its products are evil. The other industries produce stuff that is good for us like oil, pharmaceuticals, fertilisers and armaments, and it doesn't matter how much influence they purchase. The idea that tobacco companies can assist in funding cancer cures, for example, or even sponsor football, is seen as completely off the wall. It is absurd that tobacco must bear the cross of big, bad capital when there are so many companies out there, involved in activities that endanger life.

I think Monbiot is quite right to ask the question why some companies are supposedly beyond suspicion when it comes to funding higher education, especially when these companies yield so much financial clout. It's not that I don't believe some corporate higher education funding isn't inevitable, but it's quite wrong to make out that there is an issue of competing interests and apply it to tobacco and no other industry. In fact this kind of thing is a sop to anti-capitalist sentiment, allowing people to believe that they are censoring powerful industries that like to purchase government loyalty, while ignoring the fact that by and large most corporations can do whatever they like.

Issues that have aroused student protests at universities include: Newcastle students and Adidas; University of Zurich and Union Bank of Switzerland; Leeds and Swansea Universities and BAe; Oxford University and Lockheed Martin on Campaign Against the Arms Trade website; Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen and Eden Springs.

Plain packaging: ruling expected next week

Look for an announcement Wednesday, says the Sydney Morning Herald. A detailed judgement will not be available immediately but we will know in essence whether the legal challenge has won the day.

Selective outrage at hosting of tobacco-sponsored trade conference

New Zealand has seen a row following the decision of Mike Moore's decision to host a tobacco-sponsored trade conference, with New Zealand MPs demanding his dismissal.

The event attracted sponsors Philip Morris, Chevron, Phrma and others, and its organisers, Washington International Trade Association, has other global sponsors, mostly powerful international corporations including Walmart, Microsoft Pfizer, and the US Chamber of Commerce. In other words it is a conference of some of the most powerful multinational business interests in the world. Demanding the dismissal of an ambassador for hosting a conference of such business interests is gesture politics. The rationale was as follows:

"Moore's attendance at this party is a slap in the face for all those who have worked hard to stop the tobacco companies killing thousands of New Zealanders every year, and an insult to those families who have lost loved-ones to the country's most addictive drug."

Isn't this just a little OTT? People work hard in all walks of life, and the business of smoking cessation is elevated as the supreme interest that must trump every other. Or does this work 'stopping tobacco companies killing thousands of people' refer to New Zealand health services, which treat everyone with heart, lung and respiratory conditions whether or not they are smokers? Presumably New Zealand has its equivalent of this document – showing that all tobacco ingredients are approved by its health department.

The other side of this issue of course is the damage done to people by the other sponsors of the trade conference, two of which are mentioned in this list – clearly compiled by someone with limited sympathy for the businesses involved. Chevron found itself in a US court over allegations about its activities in Nigeria. The point is that there is a list as long as the Australian coastline of issues that one could use as an excuse to boycott a trade conference. Tobacco companies are accused of manufacturing department of health-approved products that are said to be lethal and of providing work for children in countries with a heavy reliance on the tobacco crop, exposing them to possible pesticide contamination. Chevron is accused of dumping toxic waste in the Amazon and paying militias to defend their mineral interests in Nigeria, where they have allegedly shot protesters and other bystanders dead. I am not fully informed about either situation, but if I were protesting about anyone at the trade conference it would have been Chevron, rather than Philip Morris.

Many powerful companies abuse and/or neglect the powerless when they can get away with it, in the course of pursuing their business interests. It goes with the territory of intense competition and imbalance of power.

Tory Health Minister criticised for dialogue with tobacco industry

Two Guardian reports feature Earl Howe's communications with Philip Morris concerning the tobacco display ban (report 1, report 2).

Communications between Howe and Gardant, a lobbying firm representing Philip Morris at Westminster, have been made public by a whistle blower at Philip Morris. They comprise a series of emails. Report 1 describes the situation like this:

It is only now that a Philip Morris whistleblower has leaked scores of the company's internal emails that the lengths to which lobbyists went to derail tobacco control measures have become apparent – nurturing a "grassroots" campaign that painted an apocalyptic picture of what would happen to newsagents if displays were banned. 

Howe, a Rugby-and-Oxford-educated peer who left a high-flying banking career to run his family farm and serve the Tories, shared these views. Along with many Conservatives, he agreed that the ban was "anti-business" and would damage the livelihoods of small shopkeepers. He also agreed with the tobacco industry's disputed claim that the ban would have no impact on reducing smoking among young people. Indeed, in one debate, he claimed that evidence from Canada and Iceland, where such bans already exist, was "at best speculative" – the key line advanced by the tobacco industry's army of lobbyists.

This is an ill-disguised attempt to divide the world in terms of evil tobacco companies with no regard for the rest of the world, and the rest of us who need protection from them.

1. Lobbyists were not 'derailing tobacco control measures', they were discussing the contents of a controversial bill. 2. I don't know quite what the Guardian refers to ('"grassroots"'), but I do know that a substantial number of people who are not lobbyists for the tobacco industry also fear for the impact on small shops once the ban is implemented in them – based on their experiences in pubs, where no economic damage was expected. 3. Howe's capitalist credentials (the report also points out that he is a hereditary peer) are only relevant insofar as they seek to persuade readers that only nastily rich people without a democratic mandate would consider opposing the tobacco display ban. 4. 'Along with many Conservatives': I'm not a Conservative, and I agree that the ban is very unhelpful to businesses. 5. The tobacco industry is not alone in disputing youth smoking figures in Iceland and Canada. More here. 6. Using a line advanced by tobacco industry lobbyists does not invalidate it, except in a world infected by the anti-democratic authoritarianism of the World Health Organisation's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (especially Article 5.3).

I hold no candle for Earl Howe and actually know very little about him beyond the banking and farming experience referred to in this article. But it seems to me that all he was doing was ensuring that the tobacco industry was able to contribute to the discussion of a bill that aimed to remove all its retail display space. Allowing an industry to participate in such a drastic bill seems eminently reasonable. From Report 2:

A spokesman for Howe said any suggestion that the government's health policies had been influenced by the tobacco industry was completely incorrect. "As an opposition spokesman, it was incumbent on Earl Howe to speak to all sides in the runup to debates on government plans to ban the display of tobacco products in shops," the spokesman said. "He met with anti-smoking groups as well as representatives of the tobacco industry. The job of any opposition spokesman is to challenge and scrutinise all proposals to ensure laws are as well drafted as possible."

Labour Shadow Health Minister Jamie Reed's response consists of more hyperbole:

"It is alarming that a health minister ever thought it appropriate to seek the help of the tobacco industry in sabotaging plans to reduce smoking-related diseases," Reed said. "Howe is the minister now tasked with forcing the government's reckless dismantling of our NHS through parliament in early 2012.

The link between a tobacco display ban and a certain decline in smoking-related diseases is tenuous indeed. The comment about dismantling the National Health Service has little relevance and is yet another attempt to link opposition to the tobacco display ban with reckless capitalism.  Reed goes on:

"Labour will be asking serious questions about his links to Philip Morris International and this further example of the close ties between Tory ministers and tobacco and junk food manufacturers."

Being shadow health minister I guess that puts attacking tobacco and junk food well within Lee's comfort zone these days, but let him not forget others, such as pharmaceutical companies and private healthcare interests, also keen to buy influence within government. Seeking influence within government is not an activity unique to tobacco interests.

If Earl Howe loses his job, this will be a shameful concession to FCTC, Article 5.3: as a nation state, our leaders should be entitled to hear submissions from all interested parties to legislation in its progress through Parliament. If as Deborah Arnott alleges his links with the tobacco industry were not properly declared this can be corrected. This is not a sacking offence, indeed it should not be an offence at all.

Happy New Year!

Philip Morris withdraws claim to see Stirling University research

Only the Independent has run with this story so far – written by Steve Connor, whose story that Philip Morris was demanding sensitive research information from Stirling University caused a furore in September.

They haven't announced that they are dropping their demand to see the information; but they have missed a deadline specified by the Scottish Information Commissioner, meaning that the only way to proceed with getting the information is to start all over again.

I'm not sure why they dropped it: it doesn't help that we have only one version of the story. According to Steve Connor the university declined to accept reimbursement from Philip Morris for costs incurred. I can't see how the Scottish Information Commissioner would accept such a refusal from the university, but I don't know all the rules (maybe there are laws against money changing hands in these circumstances, in the interests of equality).

Perhaps, having decided to sue the Australian government, they have bigger fish to fry.

Freedom of Information is a tool of aggression, says President of the Royal Society

Ten weeks after the furore caused by freedom of information requests by Philip Morris, The Independent, through the voice of Sir Paul Nurse (President of the Royal Society), attacks the use of Freedom of Information as a so-called 'tool of aggression'.

Philip Morris caused consternation by requesting details about research concerning childhood smoking undertaken at Stirling University. The Scottish Information Commissioner demanded that Stirling University should issue a substantive response – as far as I know, this is still pending (but you can hear an interview with the Information Commissioner (and with Gerard Hastings of Stirling University, including a statement from Philip Morris) at the link here).

I'm not familiar with the disruption that such FOI requests can produce. But like many readers, I find it hard to see why publicly funded research should not be put at the disposal of the public. Given that tobacco companies are systematically excluded from any public health discussions involving smoking, there is some justice in allowing them to see the fruits of publicly funded research involving their own product. I don't believe that tobacco companies should dictate public health policy, but nor should they be barred from making any contributions.

Since I don't respect the exclusion of tobacco companies from public health debates, it is unsurprising that I should feel that Stirling University should comply with the FOI request. But there is also the practical point of limiting Freedom of Information. Where would you draw the lines? How would you guarantee that the people who are granted access to the information they seek are not actually related by their third cousin's marriage to someone on the Philip Morris's board of directors?

The point of principles such as Freedom of Information is to provide transparency, and limiting it destroys the concept. There is no point in enshrining a point of principle around sharing information with people that you would happily share the information with if the principle were not in place. Like the principle of habeus corpus, it must apply to anyone if it is to have any meaning at all. There's no point in agreeing not to imprison people without charge 'unless they're terrorists').

Stirling University ran a poll on Facebook which led to a lively discussion. They won the poll, and then withdrew the page because they lost most of the points in the discussion (why remove it otherwise?) I wrote to the University to ask them where the page was: answer here.

Professors Jill Pell and Linda Bauld to speak at smoking cessation event, Edinburgh

Might as well call it a trade fair, but it's a smoking cessation conference. Jill Pell and Linda Bauld are both tobacco control advocates, as is the Minister for Public Health Michael Matheson who is also addressing the conference.

More on Jill Pell and her groundbreaking research on asthma and heart attack admissions can be found here. Not for the first time, Pell's conclusions on the health impacts of the smoking ban have been found to clash with the evidence of somebody else's data.

Linda Bauld who this year left Bath University for Stirling, is best known for her contributions to the Evidence Review of the English smoking ban, and for speaking of harassment following the disagreement with Philip Morris.

Both academics, and the Health Minister, should be wary of involving themselves too closely with smoking cessation interests. This particular conference doesn't seem to be sponsored by Pfizer or similar, though. It's hard to know what exciting things will happen there, apart from talks by Pell, Bauld and Mr Matheson – perhaps not much as it's free to get in! (check here).

(If you can't make the conference you can still train as a stop smoking support worker. Academically accredited with Glasgow Caledonian University.)

Where did our Facebook page go? The answer!

The question: 

Dear Professor Hastings

I was disappointed to see that the Facebook page discussing Philip Morris's FOI request to your University has been withdrawn.

It is very rare to get any discussion on tobacco control with key figures in the movement such as yourself and Simon Chapman. I would hope to see the page restored, and that similar opportunities will occur in the future.

The answer (after an automatic email announcing that Professor Hastings was on study leave):

Dear Belinda,

Thanks for your comments. We agree that the site provided a valuable opportunity for people to express their opinions and discuss this matter. The page was designed as a poll to provide a quick snapshot of public opinion. And in two weeks served that purpose very well indeed. 412 people voted: 352 were 'Against' handing over the data. 51 were 'For' and 9 maybes.

Our intention is to re-launch with a mandate for longer term engagement and discussion about this important issue.

Will keep you posted.

Best wishes,

Mark

Did they actually read the comments? Or just look at the poll?

Networking: tobacco control, social marketing and real friendship on Facebook

From Dick Puddlecote and CAGE Canada, reporting the disappearance of Stirling University's Freedom of Information Request page yesterday.

As if to demonstrate further the Ivory Towers mentality of tobacco control comes this letter from tobacco control advocates Simon Chapman and Becky Freeman, down under ... leading to this Facebook group. You get in only if you have the right attitude and probably the right friends.

Social marketing in, commercial marketing out ... fair enough to a point, but what's with all the secrecy? For the record, ' We don’t welcome anyone with tobacco industry ties and those who are regularly offensive.' I don't have any ties to the tobacco industry, but I won't waste their time by applying.

Stirling University takes down Facebook page on Philip Morris issue

Please correct me if I'm wrong but it looks as if this highly entertaining page – Stirling University Freedom of Information Request – has gone. Has been spirited off the face of Facebook. The link takes me to my home page, as if the Stirling University page had never existed.

Surely that was a bit drastic. They were ahead on the vote (last time I looked), most voters expressing support for the University's position. Must have been the arguments that scunnered them! from Bill Gibson, Dave Atherton, Iro Cyr, Cage Canada and others.

Background links here.

Canadian radio broadcast starring Gerard Hastings and the Information Commissioner

Via Bishop Hill comes this link to an interview with Gerard Hastings from Stirling University, defending his case against Philip Morris, and Scottish Information Commissioner, Kevin Dunion.

Edit: A permanent link to the interview is available here:

Professor Hastings makes the point that the studies in question are paid for, not publicly, but by 'a cancer charity', a somewhat cunning disguise for Cancer Research UK. One only needs to read CRUK's research preferences to understand that Philip Morris has clear grounds to assume that Cancer Research is prejudiced against its corporate interests. Professor Hastings may correct in thinking that charity-funded research should not have to comply with Freedom of Information requests – but charities that fund research should not announce their intentions to influence government policy prejudicially against the interests of specific industries. If Government chooses to outsource research to the third sector or universities it shouldn't expect to escape accountability.

After listening to Professor Hastings, listening to the Information Commissioner brings one down to earth. He is clear that the University has not understood the implications of FOI, because of Hastings' insistence that assuring his subjects of confidentiality would automatically exempt him from complying with the requirements of the law. He reiterated that he had ordered the University to provide a substantive response to the FOI request – not necessarily to provide the information requested, but otherwise to give adequate reasons for not supplying it.

Any result will be subject to appeal and could take several months.

Further comment on Stirling University and the FOI

In support of the University complying with the FOI request from Philip Morris we have this.

The second comment sets out the problem clearly:

The purpose of FOI's is enable policy making and the information and decisions leading to it, to become fully transparent. Anybody refusing to comply evidently has something they'd rather the rest of us tax paying mugs didn't see.

For Stirling read the rest of tobacco control.

A rather less reverential piece on Stirling University from Leg-Iron can be found here. I have to confess that I went to Stirling University in the 1980s and completed my degree several years later with Open University – sadly a close ally with Stirling University in Tobacco Control. My memories of Stirling University are hazy at best.

Background posts #1, #2, #3.

Stirling University versus Philip Morris: more links

Yesterday there were yet more stories in the Independent on the tussle between tobacco and the powers that be.


Tobacco giants tell Whitehall to hand over its secret minutes: discusses tobacco companies' search for evidence supporting anti-tobacco legislation. Considering that much recent legislation is manifestly unreasonable, requiring the government to show justification for it seems fair.

If data cannot be safely made public, FOI shouldn't apply: this one is written by Maurice Frankel, director of the UK Campaign for Freedom of Information.  He reckons that disclosure will make the information available to tobacco companies, and this will imperil similar projects in the future. There must be a wider public interest at stake, however, than protecting data from scrutiny by outside observers. (Does Professor Hastings really believe that his insights and work will significantly improve Philip Morris' success in the youth market?) There may be issues on which it is better not to reveal data, but if this represents a dangerous release of data I would suggest FOI isn't a very robust concept.

Reports from the Scottish press include the Scotsman (including a statement from the Information Commission) and the Record, which gives an embarrassingly emotive account of the issues (perhaps Professor Hastings should seek employment with Philip Morris as he seems to have all the insights they need?). We learn that there are 13,500 deaths a year from smoking (no reduction on 2004), and that the academics are quite right to withhold the information.

Finally from Frank Davis' blog, a response to the initial 'Exclusive' on Thursday from Stephen Connor on this issue, which reported how Professor Linda Bauld of Stirling University, also involved in the study, has received abusive communications at home. Can't find much to disagree with here.

Finally: hold the front page! more revelations from Simon Clark at Forest.

Stirling University 0, Philip Morris 1

Today the Independent newspaper reveals that Philip Morris has made a FOI request of Stirling University's Institute of Social Marketing involving data for research on the smoking habits of young people. 

In fact it is old news: the request has already been approved by the Scottish Information Commissioner in a decision dated June 2011 that criticised the University's conduct in the affair.

The tone of the Independent on this whole issue is almost hysterical. No less than three articles by science editor Steve Connor appear in today's edition:

Exclusive: Smoked out: tobacco giant's war on science

(a loaded way to describe a Freedom of Information request); 

Echoes of climate change battles are no accident

(in which tobacco and climate change are treated as identical issues); and

Hair-splitting, brazen denials and six decades of dirty tricks.

Good that you can rely on the press to be even-handed, especially when it calls itself the Independent? I have no objection to dirty tricks being reported, but the report implies that because tobacco companies have been caught in the past being less than economical with the truth their opponents in tobacco control studies have always been and will always be beyond reproach. 

As well as these three pieces we have another by Jean King at Cancer Research (which contributed to funding for the study at issue) : 'This industry should be kept away from young people.' Tobacco is just one thing that many people agree is not a product for young people's consumption. Is this a reason for a major newspaper not to ensure that both sides are properly interviewed in a report about a dispute?

The leader ('The uses and abuses of freedom') is at least slightly measured, and concludes:

Scientific research, which has a value in its own right, but potentially also a commercial and social value, could be seen as the university's exclusive property. If the university and the research, however, have taxpayer funding, should the findings not be more widely available? In the end, the Information Commissioner might have to weigh the arguments – and that might be no bad thing.

This brings us back to the fact that the decision appears to have been made already. I would have expected the writer of a leader to know this: have there been further developments since then? The University was given until 15 August to comply, and it isn't clear what has happened since then. 


Significantly, the studies are funded by the public, and their findings are expected to (at the very least) inform public policy. Gerard Hastings' pleas that the children interviewed during these studies did not expect their data to fall into the hands of tobacco companies suggest that he hasn't fully appreciated what public funding implies. As somebody comments under the article, he should not have given assurances to subjects that would run counter to his obligations under FOI.


Significantly BMJ editor Richard Smith has also agreed that Philip Morris should see the data collected at Stirling. I agree that Philip Morris should have access too, not least because the Institute of Social Marketing and Cancer Research UK are behind the studies. Their agenda is specifically anti-tobacco, and it is hard to imagine that their research can be other than policy-led. This gives Philip Morris a legitimate interest.


Edit: The Scotsman quotes the office of the Scottish Information Commissioner: 

In a statement, the office of Scotland's Information Commissioner, Kevin Dunion, said: "The commissioner has not ordered the university to release the information. He has found that the request was not vexatious, and ordered the university to make a substantive response to Philip Morris International. 

"A substantive response could include release of the information in part or whole, or a refusal to release information with an explanation of why, under the provisions of the FOI Act, the university believes this to be the correct course of action.