NOT only do they look plain but smokers are complaining that cigarettes taste worse now they are in the green packaging that becomes mandatory from tomorrow.

Advice group Quitline and Facebook fan sites have been inundated with comments saying their smokes taste "pathetic", "sickening" and lack flavour now they come in one-colour packets dominated by vivid health warnings. Tobacco companies deny changing ingredients, while pundits say the issue highlights the power of branding.

A spokeswoman for Imperial Tobacco Australia, which makes Peter Stuyvesant, Davidoff, Horizon and Camel, said the company had "not changed any of our tobacco products".

"Consumers of ITA's products can be assured that our high quality products will remain the same," she said.

British American Tobacco, which makes Winfield, Benson & Hedges and Dunhill, also denied changing the makeup of their cigarettes.

But Quitline's Fiona Sharkey said: "People are blaming the government saying, 'I think they've changed the inside and the taste'. "If those comments don't spell out how important branding is, I don't know what does."Action on Smoking and Health's Anne Jones said the complaints showed why the government was right to target the branding of cigarettes in its bid to drive smoking rates down.

Originally published as Cigarettes 'taste worse' with plain pack