Nicola Roxon (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Health and Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

I report to the House that on Friday last week the AMA presented its tobacco awards and I am pleased that our government was the recipient of one of those awards. But another government was also a recipient. We shared the AMA award for tackling tobacco with a state government. I want to give you this quote:

… I do not support receiving donations from tobacco companies. That is the position we had at the last state election; it is the position we will maintain.

These comments from the Western Australian Liberal Premier, Colin Barnett, earned him an award from the AMA for resisting the influences of big tobacco companies who are donating large amounts to the Liberal-National Party. Far from being embarrassed about this, the Leader of the Opposition went on television last week and said that not only were people welcome to donate to the Liberal Party but he would invite them to donate more. It seems that British American Tobacco giving 97 per cent of their donations to the Liberal Party is not enough; they want 100 per cent of the donations from British American Tobacco.

Obviously, we are delighted that the Liberal Party has seen what is the right thing to do. We want to congratulate the opposition for coming to its senses and I would like to nominate British American Tobacco for a Guinness Book of Records award for an own goal. The only reason we have been talking so much about this for the last two weeks is that Mr Crow went out and gave an extraordinary press conference which ultimately led to the Leader of the Opposition being so embarrassed that he had to change his position.

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