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

The member for Dawson I think may have been bettered by the member for Mitchell who, in his speech, made it absolutely clear that he does not support this legislation, and told us that 'life kills'—that we might as well not worry about doing anything on smoking because life kills anyway. What a silly statement to make in this House. It is something that the Liberal Party and the Liberal leadership should be embarrassed about. He also made the claim, which was made by many others opposite, that we enjoyed the revenue that big tobacco raised for the government. Let us correct the record here: the revenue that is raised by the excise on tobacco is five or six times less than the amount that we spend in dealing with the social, health and economic costs of smoking. This financial year it is projected that the revenue raised from tobacco excise will be $5.8 billion. The latest report indicates that the estimated health and social costs of tobacco in Australia a number of years ago was $31.5 billion annually. Therefore, the costs to our system are far greater than any benefit that the coalition says the government or taxpayers receive from this product.

The party room compromise to support plain packaging was obviously that it would oppose the trademarks amendment bill, and we are very sure that the coalition is just playing politics on this issue. In response to those opposite who claim that the trademarks amendment bill would avoid parliamentary scrutiny, I remind them that any regulations made under this act would be able to be disallowed by the parliament and they should stop playing politics on this. I also remind the House that the Howard government introduced a similar regulation making power in 2000 to implement the obligations of the Madrid protocol. The enactment of these bills will give effect to Australia's commitment under the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. The fact that we will be the first country to introduce these measures is very exciting and I am aware that a number of countries around the globe are supportive of our legislation.

One of the shadow ministers opposite raised the issue of track and trace. There are not any international agreed standards for that yet, but we are happy to continue to work on those and to do ongoing work with those opposite. The passing of this legislation will be another nail in the coffin of tobacco marketing and I commend the legislation to the House. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

See this speech in context