Last week, a Quebec Superior Court judge ordered tobacco companies to pay 15 billion dollars to smokers. The judge ruled that the companies had knowingly sold their customers an addictive and harmful product.

It's another setback for an industry that has been in retreat for decades in Canada.

And the lawyers who took on the tobacco companies called it a landmark win.

But Postmedia columnist Jim Warren says governments can go farther.

He says that, after years of incremental restrictions on tobacco products, it's time to lay down the law on smoking and ban tobacco completely