The Canadian government asked the Supreme Court to overturn British Columbia court rulings that could force it to share financial responsibility for damages caused by tobacco use, according to a report by Reuters.

The British Columbia Court of Appeals in December 2009 ruled that the federal government should be a third-party defendant, meaning it may have to share any liability that may result from lawsuits against the tobacco industry. The tobacco industry has long argued that government should share in any responsibility for damages because they were partners in the sale of tobacco by keeping it legal and collecting tax revenue from it.
The British Columbia provincial government, for instance, is suing the tobacco industry for billions of dollars in health care costs. Another case is a class action by smokers against BAT’s subsidiary Imperial Tobacco Canada. The claimants allege they were misled into believing cigarettes labelled mild or light were safer to smoke. (pi)