JTI Ireland (owner of Benson & Hedges and Silk Cut) is reportedly threatening the Irish Government with legal action if the latter goes ahead with James Reilly’s plans for plain packaging of cigarettes.
JTI have issued a thinly veiled ultimatum, giving the Government a Friday deadline to promise it will not go through with the plans.
The Government meanwhile have said that they will not bow down to pressure.
The new packaging would see the front-of-pack warning doubled in size, and all company logos removed.
A study carried out by Universities of Exeter and Bristol revealed that plain packaging reduces the likelihood of smokers wish to obtain cigarettes by almost ten percent, when compared with regularly branded packs.