OnPoint: Association of Community Retailers. Again.
139 Responses
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Keith Ng, in reply to
Keith, it never ceases to amaze me that you’re so “outraged” by the fact that retailers – yes real people who actually work in a dairy or small convenience store, actually want to have their views heard.
Are you suggesting that ACR’s press releases come from “people who actually work in a dairy”? Does Green write them? Does Gibson call up Inwood and say “oh hey Glenn, why don’t you write a press release linking excise increases with organised crime?”? Does Dipal go through the court decisions, or does she go through the Canadian studies?
Maybe they genuinely agree with the ACR’s positions. Maybe they’re paid, in one form or another, to agree. Who knows? But it doesn’t change the fact that the words coming out their mouths are written by Inwood & Co, as part of Imperial Tobacco’s strategy.
You’ve just fallen for the spin that it’s some cunning plot by the tobacco industry.
Yes. That cunning ploy by Tony Meirs to trick me into thinking that Imperial Tobacco is funding the ACR. I totally fell for that ruse.
And I suppose the Alliance of Australian Retailers, the TRA, and all the other virtually identical groups spouting identical lines across the world, that's just coincidence, right?
But why should we be surprised when you’ve never bothered to look critically at the half-truths and sometime blatant fudging of science by public health researchers who hold themselves to be beyond criticism and take a holier than thou approach.
If you did, then you’d be able to write a post that would really have you seething.
Sure, I think that the dodgy figures used by some of these groups is harmful in the same way that the shit ACR makes up is, in that it’s all pissing into our collective pool of knowledge. But it’s the deliberate way in which Big T tries to hide its footprint – a fairly elaborate system of lies – which gets my goat, and gets them this special treatment.
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Just as an aside, I found it difficult to settle on an amount to donate. If it were a straight, once-a-year donation, like for a charity, I'd normally give between $20-100. But since this was funding future stories (which is how I saw it, rather than a "reward" for this particular story), there's the implication it'll require ongoing support, so I gave $10. Which seems low, but then again I can get an entire magazine full of stories for less than $10. $20 for one story felt too high, especially if lots of others were going to chip in.
Just my thought process. Maybe something to keep in mind for this type of funding model in the future. I might just be cheap.
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Graeme Edgeler, in reply to
For the record, the science convinced 97.5% of MPs to vote for the third reading of Smoke-free Environments (Controls and Enforcement) Amendment Bill last July and so ban power walls in New Zealand.
Evidence, please. Let's start with proof that 97.5% of MPs actually know what the Smoke-free Environments (Controls and Enforcement) Amendment Bill does, and then we can move to evidence that they each made up their own mind on how to vote on the bill, and each was convinced by science and not something else.
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Graeme, you should have been a logician. The sort who says, Yes, there appears to be at least one cow which appears on the side we can see to be black in these lighting conditions.
I surrender.
But then I did read the Hansard of the debate.
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Kumara Republic, in reply to
Let’s not forget that the story here is that local news media have basically abandoned the principles of truth and objectivity (etc., etc.). Personally, I think it’s easily the single most serious problem facing New Zealand.
Let me guess... Advertising. Revenue. Turkeys. Thanksgiving. I suspect also it's the same reason behind the limited scrutiny of Hanover Finance, until the company came unstuck big time.
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I can see that there must be some small retailers whose views do align with the tobacco companies. I know with service stations, petrol has such tight margins that it's the food and grocery lines that make the profit as people come for the petrol but buy other stuff, and I imagine that some tiny retailers perceive that the extra traffic from tobacco addicts who then buy some other stuff too is the difference between survival and not. If those people aren't troubled by being dispensers of a poisonous drug, I imagine tobacco money to present views that protect their marginal businesses is very welcome. For those people, ACRA is doing the job that Carrick Graham et al claim it is.
But it is a moral problem to be a dairy owner who doesn't want to dispense a poisonous drug. If you don't sell cigarettes, you might lose custom to the next dairy that does. If I ran a dairy, I'd welcome legislation so that I could act morally without suffering a penalty relative to my competitors. Perhaps if we polled dairy owners, we'd find most of them were happy to have more stringent regulation, as long as it was applied to everyone so no one had to take a hit by volunteering.
This front group has effectively neutered any attempt to form a genuine grass roots organisation that might express a different view.
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Phil Lyth, in reply to
a dairy owner who doesn't want to dispense a poisonous drug
They exist, for instance in this TV3 story from 2007. And IIRC (Keith, got some of that evidence thingymajig for Graeme?) word is that business does not suffer for these dairies.
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Keith Ng, in reply to
Graeme, you should have been a logician. The sort who says, Yes, there appears to be at least one cow which appears on the side we can see to be black in these lighting conditions.
Actually, I think you need an epistemologist for that.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
I imagine that some tiny retailers perceive that the extra traffic from tobacco addicts who then buy some other stuff too is the difference between survival and not.
I suspect the pay-for-display revenue is more the difference.
Edit: And that's more where I see the issue. I'm not going to force a small, family business to not sell a legal product (one I have occasionally enjoyed) but I don't want it getting extra money for outsize displays for that product as a means of avoiding restrictions on advertising.
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Graeme, you should have been a logician. The sort who says, Yes, there appears to be at least one cow which appears on the side we can see to be black in these lighting conditions.
Graeme kind of reminds me of the Fair Witness profession in a Heinlein novel:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stranger_in_a_Strange_Land#Fair_Witness
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Marcus Turner, in reply to
That's exactly what I thought of!
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
Graeme kind of reminds me of the Fair Witness profession in a Heinlein novel:
An eidetic memory is a prerequisite for the job . . .
So if you were speeding down a country road with Graeme and he said "You know there's 29 bullet holes in that sign that we just passed", you wouldn't assume that he'd put them there?
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I surrender.
But then I did read the Hansard of the debate.
Without having done so, can I put some money on emotion, not scientific argument, coming to the fore?
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Keith Ng, in reply to
Just as an aside, I found it difficult to settle on an amount to donate.
Fair enough, actually. I've actually done a lot of thinking about how I'd like this particular kind crowdfunding to work. Will blog about it next week.
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Lucy Telfar Barnard, in reply to
public health researchers who hold themselves to be beyond criticism and take a holier than thou approach.
I am a public health researcher. I do not hold myself to be beyond criticism, but I do take the approach that I am holier than Carrick Graham. Is that wrong?
Nice work Keith. The question I would like answered is how the association between ACR and Big Tobacco came to be watered down, e.g. was it the original journalist or the editor?
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nzlemming, in reply to
I do not hold myself to be beyond criticism, but I do take the approach that I am holier than Carrick Graham. Is that wrong?
Don't take it personally, but small fungal growths on old cheese are holier than Carrick Graham, IMHO, so that's a pretty low bar.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
almed and dangerous...
I’ve actually done a lot of thinking about how I’d like this particular kind crowdfunding to work.
Some folk don't do the credit card thang, you could add internet banking or account details - maybe start a dedicated (Kiwi Bank!) account if you, understandably, don't want to compromise your personal banking - and maybe a PO Box to send cheques to...
What about baking and produce?
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Good story Keith. It was very interesting to see the update and the UK link.
On the service station/tight margin point - when I was home last I stayed with a couple who've owned and run a rural service station since the 1980s. They were saying that for the first ten years or so the margins from fuel sales was sufficient to provide quite a nice living, but since that point they have had to diversify and focus on non fuel sales like cigarettes as the fuel companies have squeezed the fuel margin consistently downwards. Apparently that is a common enough occurence
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Great work Keith, and well worth paying something for. I'm with Ian on the alternative payment options though...
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Great work Keith, and well worth paying something for. I'm with Ian on the alternative payment options though...
Noted! Will see what I can do.
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Phil Lyth, in reply to
Noted! Will see what I can do.
Even if it is as simple as sending bank a/c details to anyone who contacts you through that hard-to-find page on hte PAS site.
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Phil Lyth, in reply to
Without having done so, can I put some money on emotion, not scientific argument, coming to the fore?
I'd argue that science is the winner. Expanding on yesterday's brief aside:
No, it doesn't happen in the simplistic way Graeme suggested yesterday. MPs wouldn't have looked at the 2011 bill de novo or in isolation. But science has been informing the debate and the political/policy process on tobacco for 25 years, probably much longer. And progressing at a speed frustratingly slow for the public health people. But still informing both officials and Parliament.
In the 1980s it was common for offices to reek as people smoked at their desk. Then the workplace ban legislation came and while contentious, it was accepted. Further slow progress was made.
In the last Parliament there was the inquiry by the Maori Affairs Select Committee which reported in Nov 2010. They received 260 submissions and heard 96 of the submissions orally. Science was included and was tested. Then in Dec 2010 the recent bill was introduced. Again submissions were made and the science tested.
In 2012, we have reached the point where the harmfulness of tobacco is generally accepted, just as it is accepted that the earth is round. In the third reading debate last year, John Boscawen of all people quoted Helen Clark saying around 1989 that the reason for the workplace ban was because tobacco kills.
Sure, a number of MPs do the hard yards at the select committee coalface and then take issues back to their caucus. And caucuses will debate a matter. But every MP has the chance to research and question issues on any bill - and almost every MP does that one way or another. New MPs find all sorts of briefings to bring themselves up to speed on an issue, and learn they have lots of new friends wanting to an ear.
And I'd wager that every MP knows more or less what the bill does and can defend their vote if challenged at the RSA or the bowling club.
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Kumara Republic, in reply to
And not too long ago, there was the litigative precedent of a bar worker who successfully sued her former workplace for passive smoking-related lung disease.
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merc,
The funny thing is, if they make smoking illegal the Govt. will have to tell us why. Then Govts. would be questioned as to why they made so much money killing people.
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Phil Lyth, in reply to
if they make smoking illegal
Except that prohibition is not on anybody's agenda.
The Smokefree Coalition has a goal of New Zealand being smokefree by 2025, and the current Government committed to that goal when responding last year to the Maori Affairs select committee inquiry.
All actors are using a range of tools, but making smoking illegal is not part of the plan. (oops, editted to insert 'not' which was meant to be there.)
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