Canada: chicanery in the chicanes

Formula 1 (F1) racing cars fly by so fast it requires slow motion replay to judge what’s really happened. In the whir and blur of real time action, the Canadian F1 Grand Prix race in Montreal in June appeared to show tobacco control gaining a lap on the smoke industry. On closer examination, however, the image is actually fuzzier, the result less obvious. Michael Schumacher won in Montreal, as almost everywhere else on the F1 circuit, but whose interests are really coming out ahead?

Canada’s Tobacco Act, adopted in 1997, was supposed to put an end to industry sponsorship of sporting and cultural events. Major tennis and golf tournaments, as well as a raft of music, comedy, and fireworks festivals, all managed to free themselves from the grasp of nicotine stained dollars. However, some ash-laden lobbying earned Big Tobacco no less than a seven year reprieve for a “transition …