Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Hansard source

There's quite a lot in your statement there. First I would like to remind the Senate that this is a collaborative arrangement. I said earlier that every chief health officer across the country has supported this. We are supported by each jurisdiction, and it will be up to each jurisdiction to work with the pharmacies in those areas. Clearly the 6,000 pharmacies that we know are across the country will need the support and assistance of the departments of health right across each and every state and territory jurisdiction. So there is a body of work that has to go through in terms of that coordination.

Coming to your last bit in terms of direct contact with each of the pharmacies: of course I'm acutely aware of our regional pharmacies. I've had to work very closely with the ones in the Northern Territory with many of the pieces of legislation and different policies that we've taken through, which thankfully have been very embraced in terms of many of the things that we're doing in the pharmaceutical sector.

I would remind the Senate that this is not something that has just happened overnight; it's not something that just happen in the last month. Our government has said, from the moment that we came into office, that tackling vaping in this country was going to be critical, and we continue to work with the states and territories and the pharmacies across the country to ensure that this legislation does work and is effective.