Jane Hume (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise this evening also to speak on the Tobacco Plain Packaging Amendment Bill 2018. When the plain packaging bill was first introduced in 2011, I will admit to you now, I hated it. I think it was the inner libertarian in me that was so fervently opposed to this particular restriction. I really wasn't confident that prima facie, at least, just changing the colour of a cigarette packet was the most effective way to deter people from smoking. However, the jury is in, and it works. Tobacco remains a leading cause of preventable deaths and disability in Australia, and smoking is estimated to kill almost 19,000 Australians every year, with a total annual cost to the nation of $31.5 billion. This government remains committed to tobacco plain packaging as a legitimate public health measure that is consistent with Australia's international legal obligations. Such a measure has contributed to reducing smoking rates substantially over the past decade. And despite a noticeable slowing in the decline of smoking prevalence rates among daily smokers aged 14 and over, significant progress has been made among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, which is very good to note. Ongoing tobacco interventions are critical to ensuring the prevalence of smoking in Australia continues to decline. So as part of their comprehensive and strategic approach to reducing the take-up and the continued use of tobacco products, plain packaging is just one very effective weapon in the arsenal. And Australia has built that arsenal up over a very long period of time.

You might remember, Acting Deputy President Leyonhelm, that before Australia adopted some of the strictest smoking regulations in the world, advertising of cigarettes was very big business, and ad agencies had long sought clients that had the biggest budgets. From the fifties right through to the seventies, the clients with the biggest budgets were selling tobacco. They set out and they succeeded in convincing Australians that smoking was suave, sexy and a sophisticated thing to do. You might remember that slim cigarettes were tailored for the feminine hand. Craven, you might recall, was 'the clean cigarette that's kind to your throat'. Benson & Hedges were available to you 'when only the best would do'.

But one campaign was so successful in Australia that it actually backfired and prompted the backlash that ultimately saw Australia ban tobacco advertising altogether. By the early 1970s there were already warning signs, you may recall, about the risks to consumers' health, but teenagers remained a very lucrative market, and one brand in particular resonated with that market: Winfield. A fellow named Allan Johnston was the new creative director of Sydney agency Hertz-Walpole, and he was asked to come up with an idea for Winfield, which was then owned by the tobacco company Rothmans. He said they came up with this crazy idea to put Paul Hogan in a dinner suit and to have him take the mickey out of other cigarette ads. On the day of the shoot, apparently, none of the regular advertising executives turned up because they were absolutely terrified this wasn't going to work; they thought it was going to be a disaster. Hoges turned up in his tuxedo and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra were playing in the background and they were brought in. In his most ocker drawl, Hogan began: 'G'day. I've been asked to talk to you and, being a suave and sophisticated man about town'—and then he went on.

Australians loved it, but particularly the kids loved it. After the first week on air, Rothmans' chairman, whose name was Sir Ronald Irish, ordered the 'uncouth bloke' be taken off air. But he was reminded that the company were now selling one million cigarettes a day in Australia. You will remember that, 'Anyhow, have a Winfield' became part of Australia's vernacular. It wasn't long after that that Winfield overtook Marlborough as Australia's No. 1 selling cigarette. The popularity of Paul Hogan and his Winfield ads amongst teenagers was a worrying development. Winfield became the preferred brand for teenagers, and Hogan's powerful resonance with this particular market saw kids take them up at a growing rate.

Health campaigners and public sentiment were getting more and more vocal, and the link between tobacco and lung disease could no longer be ignored. By the mid-1970s, there was an increase in pressure on government to act. I'll pay credit where it's due here: it was in fact the Whitlam government that pledged extra funds to state health departments, so that they could engage in the very medium that had propelled these tobacco products and tobacco companies into people's lives in the first place, and the antismoking television advertisements began. You might remember this one, Acting Deputy President: it started, 'The human lung is like a sponge—a sponge designed to soak up air, but some people use it to soak up smoke.' You will remember the lungs squeezed and the tar squeezed out of them. It was a very powerful advertising campaign. Tobacco advertising was officially banned on Australian radio and television in 1976, although it actually remained legal, you will recall, on billboards right up until 1993.

The industry commonly claims that its promotional activities were not intended to influence and have no impact on children. In contrast, however, numerous academic reviews have identified tobacco advertising as a key influence on youth, particularly those who initiate smoking. Youth exposed to tobacco advertising hold positive attitudes towards tobacco use. The industry argues that in the absence of causal proof that advertising directly induces children to smoke, there is insufficient evidence to justify banning tobacco advertising at all. However, research examining the impact of the UK's Tobacco Advertising and Promotion Act on youth smoking found that the advertising ban actually reduced adolescent smoking intentions by signifying smoking to be less normative and socially unacceptable.

I hope that my children aren't working now, because I'm about to confess something to the chamber: I took up smoking when I was 16.