Luke Simpkins (Cowan, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this motion. There is no doubt that the coalition is the party of effective action on smoking. Our leader, the Hon. Tony Abbott, acted to achieve great reductions in smoking rates when he was the health minister in the Howard government. The efforts of the Howard government on this issue are without peer. I remind members that the graphic health warnings that were introduced by the Leader of the Opposition when he was the health minister in the Howard government remain the only substantial effort made by a federal government to reduce smoking rates in recent history. In 1998 the smoking rate in this country was 22 per cent. By 2005 it had fallen to 17 per cent—the lowest on record and one of the lowest in the world. The Howard government was responsible for this through decisive initiatives and anti-smoking campaigns. I am proud to be part of the coalition, which has acted decisively and effectively with initiatives to reduce smoking rates. This is backed up by clear evidence on these matters. I say again that the Howard government was capable of making decisions and acting decisively with regard to policy and initiation of action.

I am afraid the only thing this government is capable of is politicking. I have provided evidence of this. Last week in parliament the health minister made a number of false accusations about the coalition when she suggested that she was going to introduce legislation on the plain packaging of cigarettes and tobacco. We hold true to our position that we will consider all legislation when we have seen the detail. We will make a decision when we see the bill and any regulations proposed. This is the right course of action.

But I remain a little concerned about whether we will see such legislation, because the government's only real skill is in politicking, not the delivery of programs. There is great hypocrisy within this government. They make a very poor attempt to castigate us for waiting to see this legislation. But, given their failure to deliver workable, effective and cost-efficient legislation on border control, pink batts, capital funding and set-top boxes, there is every reason to be careful about backing anything this failure of government proposes. The Australian people expect the opposition to be critical of any legislation the government proposes, let alone legislation that, it appears, does not even exist yet.

I would like to address the health issues inherent in this motion. We all care greatly about improving the health outcomes for Australians. I hope this is a priority for the government—because it is certainly a priority for the coalition. If we had an Abbott government, we would have seen action since the report on smoking issues was handed down in July 2009. Instead, we have seen several announcements, claims of action coming and claims of legislation coming et cetera. This is typical of this government. If this government is so committed to action on health, why hasn't it acted since July 2009. It has been almost two years and the only thing the government has done is this political stunt motion. This is a suggestion that we might actually see legislation in July—by the second anniversary of this report, we might actually see this government bring some legislation into the House of Representatives.

This demonstrates the Gillard government's idea of priorities. Instead of being concerned enough about the health of Australians to take action in July 2009, they wait two years and instead make a priority of bringing this pathetic political stunt before the House. The Gillard government, faced with an opportunity to address a health problem, decided to do nothing for two years. Trying to score political points is more important to them than any legislation, so that is what they do instead of bringing legislation to the House today. This is the priority for this government: delay and politics instead of real action. The difference between the Labor Party and the coalition is that we actually accomplished something: we did the graphic warnings and we reduced the smoking rate.

I note that this motion mentions that there are three million Australian smokers and 1,500 of them die each year from smoking. I am surprised that, after two years of talking about action and only now suggesting action in July 2011, the government would mention the number of people who actually die each year from smoking. I say again that I am proud of the coalition's record and I am glad that the Leader of the Opposition, when he was health minister in the Howard government, acted to reduce smoking rates. Many people's lives were saved as a result of us taking real action as opposed to the tragic alternative strategy of this government, which was to wait two years and play politics—and maybe there might be some legislation coming towards us in July.

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