TOBACCO ESSENTIAL

Grey River Argus, 17 December 1943, Page 5

TOBACCO ESSENTIAL

Growing Use in Britain (Rec. 9.50) LONDON, Dec. T 6. Sir Alexander Maxwell, British Tobacco Controller, in an interview said: “People are still smoking more than ever. Somewhere in tne neighbourhood of two thousand million cigarettes are sold in the shops ever# week. This does not include a large number smoked by the forces. That number is a Government secret. There is one million sterling being collected daily in tobacco taxes. Tobacco is a wartime essential. It was found that production dropped when cigarettes were scarce. The man who smokes twenty cigarettes a day smokes one pound of tobacco in twenty days, and he pays thirty-five shillings in tax. The forces still receive their allowance of cigarettes at the before 1943 budget prices. The tobacco for these men is provided from America on a lease-lend basis. We pay dollars for the rest.