Watchdog backs anti-smoking advert
Updated on 17 September 2008
A Department of Health (DoH) advert showing a young girl using a crayon to imitate her mother smoking did not breach industry regulations, a watchdog has ruled.
The television and cinema ads attracted more than 200 complaints from parents worried that their children would misinterpret the warning, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) said.
The ads showed various scenes of children copying their parents doing activities such as baking, DIY and exercising, accompanied by the music I Wanna Be Like You from Disney cartoon The Jungle Book.
The last scene showed a mother smoking and her daughter copying her using a crayon, with a voice-over saying: "If you smoke, your children are more likely to smoke. Smoking. Don't keep it in the family."
The ASA did not uphold the complaints, noting that the ad attempted to persuade adults who smoked to consider the effect this had on their children.
Watching the ads was unlikely to be a determining factor in children becoming smokers in the future, it said.
The ASA said: "We considered it likely that younger children would see the ads in the presence of their parents and considered that the anti-smoking message would have an even greater impact when seen by smoking parents in the presence of their children."
The DoH said the ads were based on evidence suggesting that children who lived in smoking households were three times more likely to become smokers.
The ads aimed to motivate smokers to give up by publicly highlighting that their actions would not go unnoticed by children.
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