Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Manufacturing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I move opposition amendments (1) to (7) on sheet 1 and amendments (1) and (2) on sheet 2 together.

(1) Clause 103, page 88 (line 4), omit "for an end use solely in cosmetics", substitute "for an end use in cosmetics (whether or not that end use is the sole end use)".

(2) Clause 103, page 88 (line 5), omit "may", substitute "must".

(3) Clause 103, page 88 (line 10), after "2018", insert ", in relation to the end use of the industrial chemical in cosmetics,".

(4) Clause 103, page 88 (after line 10), at the end of the clause, add:

(3) Subsection (2) does not limit section 100.

(5) Clause 168, page 137 (line 3), omit "for an end use solely in cosmetics", substitute "for an end use in cosmetics (whether or not that end use is the sole end use)".

(6) Clause 168, page 137 (line 5), omit "requirement in subsection (2)", substitute "requirements in subsections (2) and (3)".

(7) Clause 168, page 137 (lines 6 to 9), omit subclause (2), substitute:

(2) If:

(a) the industrial chemical is to be introduced for an end use in cosmetics and one or more other end uses not in cosmetics; and

(b) a single application under this Act relating to the introduction for each of those uses would include animal test data obtained from tests conducted on or after 1 July 2018;

it is a requirement that separate applications must be made in respect of:

(c) the introduction of the chemical for the end use in cosmetics; and

(d) the introduction of the chemical for the end uses not in cosmetics.

(3) It is a requirement that an application for the introduction of an industrial chemical for an end use in cosmetics must not include animal test data obtained from tests conducted on or after 1 July 2018 in circumstances prescribed by the rules for the purposes of this subsection.

(1) Clause 96, page 80 (line 7) (table), after "category.", insert "An annual post-introduction report must be given to the Executive Director to provide information about introductions of industrial chemicals in the exempted introductions category.".

(2) Page 82 (after line 13), after clause 98, insert:

98A Post -introduction reports for exempted introductions

(1) A person contravenes this subsection if:

(a) the person introduces an industrial chemical during a registration year; and

(b) the introduction is an exempted introduction; and

(c) the introduction is the first exempted introduction of the industrial chemical by the person during the registration year; and

(d) the person does not give the Executive Director a report in accordance with subsection (2) in relation to the exempted introduction within 4 months after the start of the last month of that registration year.

(2) The report must:

(a) be in the approved form; and

(b) include the following information:

  (i) the CAS name and CAS number for the industrial chemical;

  (ii) the molecular formula for the industrial chemical (if defined);

  (iii) the date of the exempted introduction;

  (iv) the total volume of the industrial chemical introduced by the person during the registration year; and

(c) contain any other information prescribed by the rules for the purposes of this paragraph for the type of exempted introduction.

I appreciate the response the minister made to the House in the summing up of these bills. It is complicated legislation. I also thank the minister for the time he spent with me discussing many aspects of the bills. I don't accept all of the minister's explanations, and I made it clear in my address to the House why we still have some concerns.

The first matter is the issue of both the IMAP process and the risk managers. I accept the letter that the minister sent to Catherine King, our shadow minister for health, and the commitments made by the minister and, through him, by the government in respect to the continuation of the IMAP process and how we will respond to the risk managers in terms of the assessments that were carried out and what actions resulted from them. We accept that and we thank the minister for his response.

With respect to the exempted chemicals and the animal welfare data, we do still have some differences. Regardless of my personal view or those of any others who made submissions, the Parliamentary Library paper on this states:

Record keeping requirements in the new scheme do not require introducers of chemicals to inform AICIS of which chemicals they have introduced in the ‘exempted introductions’ category (the lowest risk category), only whether they have introduced chemicals in this category. This means that there will be no complete Government record of the industrial chemicals introduced into Australia.

I accept the minister's comments that this is currently not the case and that it wasn't in the previous scheme. We can learn from the previous scheme, which may not have been perfect. What we're saying is, as a result of having learnt from that scheme, let's make it better.

Secondly, there will be many more chemicals under the new scheme that will go through the exempted pathway. Therefore, it is not unreasonable to say that the government ought to maintain a register of some kind that, at some stage, if necessary, it can refer to. It will also assist the director of the department, in the ordering of audits that he or she might feel appropriate, to know what is actually coming in. It's in the public interest—it's in the government's interest—to have that register maintained. I fail to understand—given the current reporting arrangements and the fact that all of the companies that will introduce the chemicals already have to maintain a register of those chemicals so that if they get audited they can produce those documents—why that same information cannot be provided to government. I suspect most people in the community would ask the same question.

With respect to the animal welfare material, there is no reason we should put in place any particular system, whether it be the EU system or anyone else's, as the benchmark of what we should be aspiring to. I don't accept the minister's comments that this is the standard we should aspire to and that this legislation does that. What I say to the minister is that the policy now written into this legislation falls well short of the coalition's own election policy of 2016. Again, I quote the library paper:

During the 2016 election campaign, the Coalition announced that, on re-election, it would implement a:

… policy to ban the testing of finished cosmetic products on animals in Australia, the testing of cosmetic ingredients on animals in Australia and the sale of cosmetic products and ingredients that have been tested on animals outside of Australia.

I believe this legislation does have a loophole, and whether it will be used or not we can only speculate, but it does have a loophole. What we're simply saying on this side of the House is that that loophole ought to be closed and it can be. I want to requote the statistics with respect to the number of chemicals that were brought into Australia in 2014-15 in the brief time I have: 4,269 chemicals were introduced solely for cosmetic use, with only three of those using animal test data; and for multiple uses, there were 2,889, with only 11 using animal test data. This affects a miniscule amount of introducers; so, therefore, why not close the loophole rather than leaving it open? The justification from the minister is simply not persuasive. I believe that what we're asking for is not unreasonable and, can I say, there are a lot of animal welfare supporters who would support our position on this.

David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party, Assistant Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to thank the member for Makin for his comments. Just a brief word about the current system and the exempt category. Many of the opponents who have formed this opinion were of the mistaken understanding that this is creating an exempt category. As I mentioned in my speech, there is already an exempt category where 97 per cent of the chemicals that come into Australia are in the exempt category. What happens under the current scheme, though, which this new scheme is going to replace, is that it's very subjective. The introducers decide what is classed as exempted. We have changed that. There are very strict, objective criteria—not subjective and under the control of the introducer, as in, 'Trust us, we know this will be safe.' The regulator, or the executive director, sets exact criteria that they have to match. Many of these are very low volume substances that are in research and development, and some of them have very safe profiles because they are established chemicals that are known to be very safe and they are meeting the criteria that the new scheme sets.

The other comment that the member for Makin made is that we should make it better. Well, indeed, that is exactly the intention of this new objective set of criteria—to make the system better. Because no longer will they be able to just bring something in and say, 'Trust us.' In fact, if you look at some of the responses across the five community consultation papers, many of the industry people thought, 'You're making it harder for us.' As the member for Makin has told me in our six consultations—that's good, if you are getting pushback from industry. So, I am very confident that that exempt category will be a very tight category, and they will have to meet all those criteria. Then the second thing that's making it better is that the executive director has much more power to investigate, remove and assess immediately when there is any concern. Part of the system is currently very slow and laborious to get some intervention by NICNAS. For the regulatory and civil penalties, there are much stronger enforcement, investigation and assessment powers so that the community and the general public can be reassured that the regulation is tighter but it's proportionate to the risk. There's even a touch of paranoia in some of the comments that have been circulating in correspondence coming in and out of our office about the animal testing.

That's the last thing I would like to make a comment on. This is a major improvement. Ninety-nine per cent of animal testing for cosmetics—going forward from 2018, if you are bringing in a chemical purely for cosmetics, it won't be allowed. However, in the 1 per cent of cases where it's really important to know that chemical which is used in multiple things—because not every product has one chemical in it, and most products have lots of chemicals, and it's very important for people who are exposed to chemicals. As I mentioned to the member for Makin, in my career as an industrial cleaner and a hospital cleaner I was exposed to hundreds of solvents and various industrial solutions that had very little product information.

The jurisdictions have a place in this as well. It is a very robust system that we have. In an attempt to get absolute philosophical purity, those opposite are going to miss out on achieving a 99 per cent improvement and better regulation to prevent unnecessary testing on animals. This is better than jurisdictions across the Tasman Sea. As I mentioned, we have confirmation that we're in keeping with what they do in the European Union. We are as good as any other jurisdiction. I commend the bill to the House.

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the amendments be agreed to.

Bill agreed to.