New Zealand notified its intention to introduce the legislation in documentG/TBT/N/NZL/62, which includes a link to its health ministry for further information. The proposal was agreed in principle by the Cabinet in April 2012, New Zealand said, and was open for consultation from July to October. Information and comments are being compiled and no draft legislation has been issued so far, it said.

The delegation said smoking is the most serious preventable cause of death in New Zealand, and is most serious among the Maori population. The government aims to make the country essentially smoke-free by 2025, it said.

Expressing concern were the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Mexico, Zambia, Cuba and Zimbabwe. They said the measure would hurt their tobacco producers and would restrict trade more than is necessary to meet the health objectives.

Supporting New Zealand were Australia, Norway and Canada, and the World Health Organization (an observer in the committee). They said the measure is justifiable in view of how serious are the problems caused by smoking.

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Examples of the new plain cigarette packaging in Australia Photo: Rex Features

It has for the first time admitted to having nearly $30 million invested in tobacco companies. The figures were provided in an answer to a budget estimates question asked by the Greens NSW MP John Kaye.

The NSW Treasury Corporation, known as TCorp, has at least $28.7 million invested through two trusts, the NSW Treasurer, Mike Baird, revealed.

For months, the government has refused to answer questions about its tobacco investments, which are managed by independent fund managers.

Mr Baird, and the NSW Minister for Health, Jillian Skinner, both said on Tuesday the government would review its investment in tobacco companies, and give a decision by the end of the year.

The chief executive of Action on Smoking and Health Australia, Anne Jones, said it was hypocritical for the government to allow tobacco investments when they could be easily screened out.

The director of the Public Health Advocacy Institute, Mike Daube, said he was appalled government money was invested in tobacco companies, particularly as tobacco control programs had had their funding cut in recent years.

“It is unacceptable. Sixty years after we learnt of the dangers of smoking, one million Australians have died because they smoke, and the state government shouldn’t be profiting from that,” he said. “They should take their investment out of tobacco and put it into tobacco control.”

Dr Kaye said the government could no longer hide behind the excuse of fund managers controlling investments.

He said Mr Baird had only provided him with data for two of 12 trusts.

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A packet of Winfield Blues is no longer the colour its name would suggest – instead a sickly looking olive green sets the ailing backdrop for photos of health-plagued smokers in various states of decay.

The new packets, which use the same font for any brand or type of cigarette, will be the only legal packaging available from December onwards.

Free Choice Tobacconist owner Robert Anderson said his Hooper Centre store had already sold most of its old, colourful stock.

If any old packets are still in circulation when December arrives, representatives from tobacco companies will buy them back from stockists.

He believed smokers would not take the decision lightly.

“I think the new packets are obscene, but that’s what the government wants,” he said.

“If they think it’s going to stop people from smoking cigarettes, they’ve got another think coming.

“It’s the worst thing they could do if they want the votes of the smoking public . . . another nail in the government’s coffin.”

Mr Anderson said he was not worried about any negative impact on his business.

He said it would only help sales of certain smoking accessories.

“The general public feeling is that it’s a fair dinkum joke,” he said.

“I think the sale of cigarette cases (to cover the disturbing images) will really come to the fore.”

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From this date forward, all cigarettes will be sold in drab, olive-green packaging with enormous health warnings, with the brand only visible in a small, standard font. The government hopes to make smoking less appealing to children and reduce smoking levels population-wide. “This is good news for every Australian parent who worries about their child picking up an addictive and deadly habit”, said Roxon, who, as Australia’s former Minister for Health and Ageing, introduced this pioneering legislation. Big tobacco has not yet given up, with two other cases ongoing. Philip Morris Asia is suing Australia for breach of an investment treaty with Hong Kong, while Ukraine, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic have fi led a complaint with the World Trade Organization, claiming the legislation breaches Australia’s commitment under global trade rules. Both cases are likely to take years and will not prevent Australia actually introducing plain packaging. However, should the tobacco companies succeed, the government would likely have to fi nancially compensate them for their loss of brand (but not withdraw the plain packaging).

WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said she hoped that this decision would start a domino-eff ect of similar legislation in other countries, helping prevent some of the 6 million deaths estimated to be caused by smoking every year. The UK has just fi nished a consultation on plain packaging and another is ongoing in New Zealand.

The European Union has announced it will probably revise its tobacco products directive during 2012, which could include plain packaging measures. “This decision will embolden governments, especially in low- and middle-income countries, that have been hesitant to implement the
measures in the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control [FCTC], fearing some sort of ‘backlash’ from the tobacco industry, such as a lawsuit”, said Laurent Huber, Director of the
Framework Convention Alliance, a group of more than 350 organisations in more than 100 countries that support the FCTC. “India, South Africa, Indonesia, and China are said to be
considering plain packaging”, he added.

By Tony Kirby of the Lancet

Delegates attending trans-Pacific free-trade negotiations in the United States are being warned their countries could end up like Australia if they agree to allow corporations to sue governments in international courts.

Australia is fending off a challenge to its plain cigarette packets legislation from Philip Morris International under the terms of an obscure Hong Kong investment treaty even though Philip Morris has lost its case against Australia in the High Court.

“The Philip Morris company’s persistence with the investor state dispute settlement case shows such procedures are a threat to democratically enacted legislation and national judicial decisions,” Australia’s Patricia Ranald told stakeholders forum at the negotiations in Leesburg, Virginia.

The United States is insisting on so-called investor state dispute settlement (SDS) provisions in the Trans Pacific Partnership even though it does not have them in its existing free-trade agreement with Australia and even though Australia has said it will not sign a deal that includes them.

The Trans Pacific Partnership will encompass Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam, many of whom already have in their agreements with the United States clauses that allow corporations to sue governments in supra-national forums.

Philip Morris International moved the head office of its Australian subsidiary to Hong Kong shortly before it launched action against Australia under the terms of Hong Kong treaty in what Dr Ranald said was jurisdiction shopping.

“Philip Morris International described itself as a US-based company when it made a submission in 2010 to the US trade representative supporting an investor state dispute settlement process in the trans-Pacific partnership.”

“However, it claimed to be a Swiss-based company when it used an investor state dispute settlement process to sue the Uruguayan government for damages under a Uruguay-Swiss investment agreement when Uruguay introduced legislation restricting tobacco advertising.

“Philip Morris can also claim to be a Hong Kong company because Philip Morris Asia, incorporated in Hong Kong, invested in Australia by becoming the sole shareholder of Philip Morris (Australia) after the Australian government announcement of its intention to legislate for plain packaging of tobacco.”

Speaking as convener of the Australian Fair Trade and Investment Network the Sydney University academic told the forum Australia’s problems showed none of the eleven nations negotiating the treaty should agree to provisions that would allow corporations to sue them extra-nationally.

Sean Donnelly from the US Council for International Business told the forum investor state dispute settlements procedures did no more than give international investors access to the rule of law.

He said business would like more protections, but believed what the US was proposing struct the right balance.