Analysis On The Legitimacy Of The Tobacco Plain Packaging System

Tobacco plain packaging as a tobacco control measure which has not been fully exploited, has been accepted by many Western countries and began to promote gradually, But the disputes between the public health and trademark restrictions caused by the system more and more frequently appeared in the domestic and international dispute resolution mechanisms.Australian Federal legislative committee formally adopted Tobacco Plain Packaging Act in 2011, Australia became the first country in the world to regulate tobacco products’ package in a plain and standardized manner, This not only brings more attention and discussion to the tobacco plain packaging system, also triggered a worldwide boom in tobacco plain packaging legislation.Once the law was published, it has been pushed to a barrage of complaints, academic controversies and comments on the case also emerged in endlessly, however, analysis from the perspective of the Australian domestic law was very few. This paper takes the two controversial focus of “JT International SA v Commonwealth of Australia” and ”British American Tobacco Australasia Limited v The Commonwealth” as the core, analyzes the legitimacy of the Tobacco Plain Packaging Act from the perspective of the Australian domestic law, demonstrates the global development trends of the tobacco plain packaging system.Save as the introduction and conclusion, this article consists of three sections:Chapter One first introduces the background of tobacco plain packaging system and the controversies it has aroused. The background of Tobacco Plain Packaging Act of 2011 and the controversial focus of “ JT International SA v. Commonwealth of Australia” and “British American Tobacco Australasia Limited v. The Commonwealth” are introduced in detail.Chapter two makes discussion of impacts the Tobacco Plain Packaging Act of 2011 would render upon trademark protection regime from the perspective of Trademark Act of 1995, focus the analysis on the influencewhich the Act brings to the trademark rights, then makes a summary.Chapter three is about analysis on whether the Tobacco Plain Packaging Act violate the s 51(xxxi) of the Australian Constitution, contrasts and analyzes the related clause of the Fifth Amendment, discusses whether the Tobacco Plain Packaging Act acquired the tobacco companies’ property combined with Australia’s constitutional jurisprudence.Chapter four takes the major countries’ current tobacco plain packaging legislation as the breakthrough point, demonstrates the future global development trends of tobacco tobacco plain packaging system, and predicts what the choices as China’s tobacco industry may make in controlling tobacco.Finally summarizes the full text, points that plain packing system restricted the use of trademark in order to protect public health, it has legitimate reasons, doesn’t influence the existing trademark protecting system. Compared with the developed countries, the level of China’s tobacco controlling is still lagged far away, we can introduce the plain packaging system into the future tobacco controlling programs.