British victims give US verdict a cautious welcome

BRITISH anti-smoking campaigners were cautious yesterday about the impact of the San Francisco jury's verdict. Success on one side of the Atlantic does not automatically lead to success on the other.

British lung cancer victims seeking compensation from UK tobacco companies suffered a serious setback this week when a high court judge decided not to exercise his power to allow eight test cases, lodged outside the legal time limit, to proceed against Gallaher and Imperial Tobacco.

The sufferers had asked Mr Justice Wright to use his discretion under the 1980 Limitations Act to waive a rule stating that such claims must proceed within three years of diagnosis of the disease.

The decision means that 36 of the original 52 plaintiffs are now barred from proceeding. The remaining 16 are considering whether to fight on.

Clive Bates, director of Ash, the anti-smoking pressure group, said: "If this US decision had come a month ago I would have said brilliant. Now I am not so sure. The judge in the UK case has, in refusing to exercise his discretion, displayed his ill will and displeasure towards the plaintiffs. Some of the 16 who could still proceed are quite frail and the prospect of being grilled by the tobacco companies' lawyers is quite unpleasant.

"They are determined to pursue their claims but they have to decide whether it is worth proceeding. The court has put a big hurdle in front of the case."

Gordon McVie, director- general of the Cancer Research Campaign, said: "This is another nail in the coffin for the tobacco industry. But the danger is, the more we hound them in this country and the US, the more likely they are to target their activities in the Third World. I hope it will give lawyers for cancer patients in this country ammunition to appeal against the judge's decision here."

A spokesman for Imperial Tobacco in the UK said: "The legal situation in the US is completely different and this has absolutely no relevance to the situation here."