David Littleproud (Maranoa, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Therapeutic Goods and Other Legislation Amendment (Vaping Reforms) Bill 2024 and the amendment moved by the member for Cowper. I have the same genuine intent as everyone who stands in this place and in the other place to make sure we formulate good policy that protects children. We all come to this place with that intent with this issue. I was part of a government that moved down a prohibition model, and I'm big enough to stand here today before the Australian people and say I got it wrong. I got it wrong. The statistics don't lie. Only about eight per cent of people who vape today have a prescription. The prescription model didn't work.

As I visit small communities, listening to teachers and headspace representatives, the biggest issue they're facing at the moment is vaping. As legislators of this great country, we have an opportunity; we've been given a privilege to get it right, to admit when we get it wrong and to shift when we have the opportunity. The opportunity sits in front of this parliament. While the intent of the bill and much of what it's trying to achieve go very much to what we want to see happen in terms of the regulation of the product, it's about understanding that what we have done in the past hasn't worked and being big enough to admit that.

I don't contest the science or the health advice. No-one should. It's indisputable. But I've got to say, with all due respect to the Cancer Council and the AMA, that's where their expertise ends. Regulating borders, regulating markets are not the expertise of the AMA or the Cancer Council. And they come to this with the same intent as every one of us in this building—to try and make sensible reforms about what is a scourge on our society. When we see children as young as eight on vapes, we know we've got to do something. What we've done by bringing forward a prohibition model has made it worse so, so we've got to shift the dial and look to what has worked in the past. I acknowledge the previous speaker, the member for Swan, in acknowledging that many of the reforms that were put in place by a Labor government in the past, around plain packaging and about ensuring a regulated point of sale for those that are over 18, have worked. In fact, we saw an 80 per cent reduction in juvenile use as a result of those courageous reforms. At the time, they were courageous reforms, which they should not have been. But they were the right reforms that the minister and the government at the time had the courage to undertake.

When you look at the history, when you look at what's worked and when you look at what's in front of us, then you realise we've got to do something different. We've got to make sure that, at the heart of that, it's protecting the next generation. The greatest achievement of this is that we will see generations in the future not just not vape but not use cigarettes either. That would be a significant accomplishment, to see a significant reduction, if not a removal, of that because of the courageous steps that we take now—not ones that work on a prohibition model.

History has shown for generations that prohibition doesn't work, particularly when you've got a marketplace that has exploded. In essence, the genie's out of the bottle. As the father of four young boys, their potential use of this product, the content and where they may get it frightens me. As someone who was a former agriculture minister, I can tell you that I have had experience managing a border and having an agency that is there to try and protect Australia. To think that we're going to be able to crack down and stop all this at the border is naive. It won't happen. Unfortunately, the consequence of that will be an unregulated product doing more harm, particularly to our children. When we see the consequence of what I voted for in the last parliament—I see that consequence daily. I've got to be big enough to admit that I didn't get it right. But I've got to look at what I can do in getting it right in the future.

The National Party has been clear on this. We've taken that step. As a party room we've understood that, while our intent was right—our intent was about making sure that this product was brought in to try and get people off cigarettes—it hasn't worked. This isn't about big tobacco. In fact, if you want to take big tobacco out of this, you could regulate a product in this country where big tobacco isn't even allowed to actually display the contents of it. Why wouldn't we think about what the options and the possibilities are, that have worked previously, that we've got to be able to regulate a product? We're not trying to be reckless in anything we're doing. We're simply saying that much of the work that a previous Labor government has done with cigarettes should be heralded as a symbol and as an example of how we can minimise harm, particularly for the next generation. We believe in having licensed points of sale. We believe that only people over 18 should have these products. There should be strict verification of that. There shouldn't be packaging targeted at children. That's abhorrent. I think we're all in agreement on that. We should be regulating the contents of this product.

What you've got to understand is that, with the path that we've gone down—saying that you've got to go and get a prescription to go to a pharmacy to get this, when we have over 1½ million Australians already doing this—I think we're naive to think that they're going to change their habits because of that. I don't doubt that there'll be some success at the border and some other places. In fact, the night before last I saw that 30,000 vapes were intercepted at the border. That's about two or three hours worth of vaping. It's not going to touch the sides.

We've got to understand that, yes, there's an opportunity to make sure that we can police better. When you talk about policing, there are also issues around the alignment between federal and state responsibilities. In fact, as someone that caught up with the Queensland Police Service in the last couple of weeks, they're short 4,000 police officers in Queensland alone. When domestic violence and juvenile crime are out of control, the police force don't have the resources to then be pumped into what the government is asking them to do. It's making it harder. We were saying that we were going to police our way out of this. They don't have the resources to do it to start with.

Much of that could be changed, in many respects, if we're honest with ourselves, through a regulated product, through the excise that could be achieved. And the excise should be done in a responsible way, with the medical advice about how we actually can use this product to try and transition people and get them off not just cigarettes but vapes as well, get them off tobacco entirely, and using that excise in a way that would not only educate the next generation of potential smokers and vapers but also be about investing in policing of the border and the streets. An opportunity sits in front of this parliament to look at this differently and to take a dagger to the heart of organised crime that is out there flourishing because of the prohibition model.

I said before that history shows that prohibition hasn't worked. You only have to look at when prohibition was put in place. Who benefited? It was organised crime. This is where we have to look at the past and the things that we have done that have worked. So I think there is an opportunity for this parliament. We won't stand in the way of this bill. It is important that we try to continue to work on a pathway of getting an understanding. But the Nationals haven't changed our position. Prohibition doesn't work. A regulated model will work and gives us a better chance at protecting children. So, when the bill leaves this place and goes over the way to the Senate, it's important that it goes to an inquiry and that we test those principles and theories. I respect that we all come with the right intent, the very purest of intent—all of us. But at some point, at some juncture, when the statistics show that it's getting worse not only here but also in New Zealand, where they've taken this model—a 39 per cent reduction since 2020, when they went to a regulated model—we know that not only is history showing us but the world is showing us. And while we can stand there and beat our chests about having apparently the strongest laws in the world, it will mean nothing if we still see children on these vapes and the next generation on these vapes. I hate these things. I hope my children are never on them and I hope they go nowhere near cigarettes. But I'm a pragmatist, and I have been given the greatest privilege that any Australian has ever been given: to sit in this place and to make a difference. But I'm going to make that difference on the basis of my lived experience and to stand up and say, 'I got it wrong and I'm going to try and get it right as best I can.'

So, I respect the government and all they are trying to achieve; in all honesty, I do. They come to this with the right intent. But unfortunately we are going down a trajectory that has been influenced too greatly—solely—by medical advice. As I said, I don't challenge that medical advice. I'm just saying that the weighting is that the medical advice and the health advice cannot be contested, but that's where it should end. It is in the regulation of it that the police and politicians need to understand—the agencies need to understand—how we can do this better.

I welcome the bill. I can't say that I support the trajectory the government's taken, but I respect their position wholeheartedly. I suspect that at some juncture we'll all be back here again, and I might be standing here saying, 'You were wrong.' I just hope we will all say, 'We got it wrong and we're going to need to change this and get it right, because what we've done in the past hasn't worked.' I commend the bill to the House.

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