Tobacco giants in UK suffer defeat on plain-packaging

Tobacco companies have lost their legal challenge against new cigarette plain-packaging rules in Britain.

Anti-smoking campaigners described it as a crushing defeat.

The day before new regulations were to come into force, a high court judge in London declared that they were “valid and lawful in all respects”, and rejected a judicial review action brought against the UK health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, by four of the world’s biggest firms. Mr Justice Green yesterday said: “There is no basis upon which I could, or should, strike down the regulations, or prevent them coming into effect tomorrow.”