Jordon Steele-John (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I speak tonight on behalf of the Greens on the Therapeutic Goods and Other Legislation Amendment (Vaping Reforms) Bill 2024. I begin by acknowledging that the rising rates of nicotine dependence in our community are a significant public health problem. We have been deeply concerned about the explosion of vaping rates among our children. The status quo in Australia is far from ideal, and reform to ensure that the tobacco industry's grip on our community is broken and long overdue.

The tobacco industry has been prioritising its profits taken at the expense of the wellbeing of our community for far too long. It is shameful that the policy settings of this country have allowed a new generation to become addicted to nicotine. These harmful products have been allowed to feature cartoon characters, to be accessible to kids within 100 metres of a school and have enabled them to be sold where products have been and often are targeted to children. In addition, we have seen products sold in Australia despite them being unsafe, falsely labelled and with dangerous, unknown ingredients often contained within them.

The Greens welcomed the referral of this bill to inquiry. It was essential that the community have the opportunity to feed back on this legislation. Through that inquiry, I was committed to hearing a range of perspectives. I've heard from people who have been long-term cigarette smokers who feel that vaping has improved their health and wellbeing. I've heard from healthcare professionals who are concerned about the unknown impacts of vaping products. I've heard from people who have business interests in vaping product who feel they've done the right thing to this point. I've heard from parents and teachers about their deep concerns about the impacts of vapes on our young people. I've heard from schoolkids who have shared with me how access to vapes have contributed to peer pressure and to bullying. What has been clear is that the status quo is failing. It is failing far too many. It is time for change.

The Greens have come to this debate with a clear-eyed acknowledgement that the war on drugs—prohibition—has failed. At the heart of this failure is a deep desire of politicians to criminalise people who are experiencing drug dependency. We cannot let that continue for people who are dependent on nicotine vaping products. Our goal through this process has been to ensure that we get vapes out of the hands of kids, while ensuring that adults can access therapeutic vaping product and guaranteeing that there is no chance that an individual is criminalised for possessing a personal vape.

The Australian Greens felt that the original legislation proposed by the government did not meet these goals. This is why we have used our role in the Senate to chart a pathway away from a restrictive, costly policy to one that strikes a greater balance. The Greens have secured carefully crafted amendments that will enable the creation of an equally carefully regulated scheme that focuses on public health outcomes, reducing harm and minimalising use, particularly among children. I acknowledge the government for working constructively with us to secure these changes, which will be presented as government amendments. It is with these amendments that the Greens will support the legislation's passage through the Senate.

I'd now like to step through what exactly the Greens have secured. Let's be clear; these are significant changes to the government's prescription-only model that risked criminalising people for possessing vapes for personal use. The first significant change and improvement is an amendment to the legislation from a GP-prescription model to a pharmacist-only medication for adults over 18 years of age. This will see nicotine vaping products become a schedule 3 medication, where an adult can go to a pharmacy, have a conversation with a pharmacist and get a therapeutic vaping product. This product will be in plain packaging, and the ingredients will be clearly marked. At the end of the day, this will mean that many people will not need to go to their GP—perhaps taking time off work to do so—to then pay out-of-pocket to get a repeat prescription. This will save people hundreds of dollars a year. GPs will still be able to prescribe vaping products—something we have ensured for people who want to have the support of their GP for smoking cessation—and, importantly, GPs will be able to be part of the support system for people under the age of 18 who have become, often unintentionally, addicted to nicotine. GPs will still be able to prescribe vaping products, something we have ensured for people who want to have the support of their GP for smoking cessation. Importantly, GPs will be able to be part of the support system for people under the age of 18 who have become, often unintentionally, addicted to nicotine.

Our second change and significant improvement is that the Greens have ensured that people will not be criminalised for their possession of personal vapes. It is not well known that the original proposal from the government had a pathway for individuals to face hefty fines and criminal charges for personal possession of vaping products. The Greens have secured and ensured that there will be an exemption for personal use, and we have additionally secured an amnesty period for individuals until 30 June 2025. I hope that this will provide some certainty to community, and I note that there will still be strong penalties for people seeking to make a profit and sell vapes in commercial quantities. Again, we have struck a balance by increasing access to vaping products for adults while ensuring that we reduce the impact of the tobacco industry.

Thirdly, in striking this balance, we must acknowledge that this legislation will be a first. In fact, it will be a world-leading piece of legislation. Because of this, the Greens felt it was vital to legislate a review of this policy. Because of our work, the Greens have ensured that these policy settings can be evaluated and community can give feedback, and community feedback will be sought. To ensure a robust review, we urge the government to focus on improved data collection, and we also urge the government to actually invest in education for our community. Ultimately, the goal of this review will be to ensure we have the harm reduction settings right.

Fourthly, many in our community have raised concerns about the number of disposable vaping products that are littering our streets and our waterways. We do not have a clear picture of just how many vaping products are thrown out across Australia each year, but we do know that people are hoping to do the right thing—that is, to responsibly dispose of a product containing a lithium battery. There are few places in Australia where you can do so. This is why the Greens have pushed to make it easier to safely dispose of vaping products by getting the government to expand their Return Unwanted Medicines program to allow for disposable vapes. What this means in real terms is that people can take their unwanted vapes to a pharmacy and dispose of them safely.

This commitment to take back vaping products will go a long way to getting lithium batteries out of our waterways and out of our landfills and reduce the risk of lithium-battery-related fires. We know that many are concerned about the increasing incidence of lithium ion battery fires. Indeed, the 7.30 report has revealed that lithium ion batteries have caused more than 1,000 fires in the last year alone. Of course, this is not just about vaping products, but nonetheless it is clear that this government had failed to address the problem of lithium batteries. The Greens amendments will reduce the risk, but we urge the government to do more to invest in solutions for the recycling of lithium batteries and other vaping components.

The fifth improvement the Greens have secured to this legislation is that advertising of vaping products to healthcare practitioners will be further restricted. This amendment recognises that the marketing tactics used by the tobacco and vaping industry can often be incredibly unethical and that healthcare professionals providing vapes to adults should not be subjected to that. The Greens have heard from the community and from public health organisations like the Cancer Council of Australia that they have concerns about big tobacco having an avenue to influence pharmacists and to do so in an unethical way. This amendment will restrict that in order to keep vapes within a therapeutic framework rather than a profit framework. Lastly, but by no means less importantly, the Greens have secured additional funding commitments from the government to support young people quitting vaping.

To close my contribution: we must ensure that no-one is incentivised to return to cigarette smoking and that people can get the support that they need when they need it. That's why the Greens have been willing to work with the government to amend the legislation to ensure that no person will be criminalised for personal possession of vapes and that people can access therapeutic vapes as needed. We have also ensured a review of the legislation so that we can ensure that it is meeting its harm reduction goals.