Peter Whish-Wilson (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I've listened to both sides of the debate tonight and I've got to say that both the Labor Party and the LNP have got some good points. Specifically, I don't necessarily want to talk about the health risks posed by vapes but about the environmental risks. Like Senator McDonald, I do want to admit that I'm an ex-smoker. I was one of those smokers who never thought they were a smoker. I went weeks, or months sometimes, without having a cigarette, and then I'd go on holiday and smoke a packet and think, 'What am I doing?' This went on for years.

Well before single-use vapes were on the market, I did buy a reusable vape from a tobacconist and I did use vapes to get off cigarettes. For me, that worked very well, and I want to disclose that tonight. I think it's important for me to do that. But I also can attest to just how addictive single-use vapes are. I haven't used a vape for a while now, but I do know people in my family who still do, including young people. I also know they're readily available. Even though the government's been cracking down and putting in their best endeavours to stop them at the border, they are still readily available to most young Australians right now.

My party has openly talked about the fact that we don't support prohibition. We don't think prohibition works. We think government regulation and harm minimisation is the best way forward. Personally, I would like to have seen vapes regulated in the same way that cigarettes were regulated. However, that's not going to be the case, so I have just a few comments about the pharmacy model.

To get off vapes, I had to go to pharmacies, and I'll admit tonight that I also bought Nicorettes, nicotine gum and nicotine spray, and that worked. Within a month or six weeks, I no longer felt like I needed to vape any longer. Those products worked for me and they were available at a pharmacy. Pharmacists have jumped up and down in the last couple of days about the fact that they may have to sell reusable vapes and cartridges with nicotine dispensing products, but they do sell nicotine products in pharmacies already. They were originally schedule 3, where they were available only by asking for a pharmacist, and now they're schedule 2. You can walk into any pharmacy in Australia—I obviously am over age, so no-one ever asked me for my ID, but I'm guessing anyone can go and buy nicotine lollies or patches at a pharmacy. I'd be happy to be proven correct, but those nicotine products are available for anyone who wants them in a pharmacy. So it's not a big stretch, as someone who has walked this path themselves, for me to imagine that, by going into a pharmacy, I can buy another form of nicotine dispensing in the form of a reusable vape with the cartridges dispensed by a pharmacist to help me get off cigarettes.

I think I also know, from personal experience, that the flavours that are going to be offered under this model will not appeal to a lot of people. I don't think they're going to be appealing to young people, and even people trying to get off cigarettes are probably going to struggle with them, so I hope they work. Vaping did work for me, long before the single-use vapes came on the market. I couldn't go back to smoking after I tried vaping. Smoking became so unpleasant. It actually worked for me.

I know the evidence is mixed, but I'm just telling my personal story here tonight. I do think the pharmacy model is worth trying. Senator Steele-John has done an amazing job negotiating with the government to get some changes in a number of areas, including a review of this legislation in the years to come. I hope for those people who want to get off cigarettes that they can go into a pharmacy, ask the pharmacist for a reusable vape and buy the cartridges. I've seen the cartridges in other forms, such as medicinal cannabis. I know what's available out there. Presumably, you use a vape pen or something similar that you charge in your wall at home. Therefore, you don't have lithium batteries going into the environment like we have with single-use vapes. It is better for the environment, and hopefully, it will actually generate a positive health outcome for smokers who want to get off nicotine and cigarettes.

In terms of the environment, single-use vapes are a real problem. It's not just because they're not being recycled but also because they're dangerous. When they're thrown in the litter stream and compacted under pressure with heat, they can cause fires—and they are causing fires. It's been a serious issue now for a long time. I've talked to some recyclers about how they're dealing with this issue. I know there are some places where they're just literally being crushed in special machines where they can't start fires. I have no idea what they're being used for, in terms of the aggregates that they're forming from crushing these vapes. At the moment, they can be recycled, but they're not being recycled.

At the end of the day, we don't want them for health reasons, and there's a better alternative than having a product on the market that most people are just going to throw away. It's going to make its way to landfill or it's going to start a fire in a garbage truck. I'm sure that Senator Sheldon, through his work with truck drivers, knows just how dangerous it is at the moment for many workers in the waste disposal industry. It's a very serious risk that they're dealing with right now. I'll be quite glad to see the end of single-use vapes from an environmental point of view.

I would just say to everyone that this is a good compromise that has been reached here tonight. Both sides have got some valid points. There is going to be a lot of work to do to crack down on the black market. Now the genie is out of the bottle and single-use vapes are popular, it's going to be a lot of hard work to stop them coming in at the border. Organised crime have managed to sell other illicit drugs now for decades and make a lot of money out of them. They're making a lot of money out of vapes already, and there's a big road ahead of us here to actually eliminate them from society and from our waste stream. I think we should give this a go. I'm proud of the amendments that the Greens have been able to negotiate with the government on this, and we will be supporting this bill.