Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

These bills—the Excise Tariff Amendment (2009 Measures No. 1) Bill 2009 [No. 2] and the Customs Tariff Amendment (2009 Measures No. 1) Bill 2009 [No. 2]feel a little bit like Groundhog Day. I can indicate that I again support this legislation.

I note the undertaking given by the minister to me, Senator Brown and Senator Siewert, in a letter of 17 March of this year, to provide an additional $50 million worth of funding for further measures to combat binge drinking; a fund to provide sponsorship to local community organisations that provide sporting and cultural activities as an alternative to other forms of sponsorship; community level initiatives designed to tackle binge drinking; enhanced telephone counselling services and alcohol referrals; and a possible expansion of the existing social marketing campaigns. Further, there are a number of measures that the government indicated it would be taking, including, for the first time, the pre-vetting of alcohol advertising. I would be grateful if the minister could provide confirmation of the fact that there will be pre-vetting of advertising by an expert panel for the first time. These are important matters.

I note that the sales of so-called alcopops have rebounded, despite the excise increase, according to an article in the West Australian of 8 August. Could the minister comment on the Nielsen data that indicates that the sector has bounced back to an extent but that it still appears to be significantly reduced from what it was before this increase. The Senate inquiry into this also indicated that there has been an overall reduction—albeit a marginal reduction—in the number of drinks sold, in terms of the total volume of alcohol, even with the issue of substitution. So this is not a magic bullet. I have never said that of this particular tax. For the government to say that it was a health measure in itself is a tad disingenuous, but it is fair to say that providing extra funding for health measures on top of the $50 million that has been agreed to between my colleagues in the Greens, me and the government, in addition to the $53 million that has been specifically set aside for binge drinking, is a good start. These are measures that need to be further evaluated and encouraged so that we can begin effectively tackling the binge drinking culture in this country, particularly amongst young people. I support this bill, I think we need to get on with it and I am looking forward to the additional $50 million that was undertaken by the government to be spent on this in accordance with the agreement between the Greens, me and the government and for those programs to have the effect that I and others believe they will have in winding back the serious problem of binge drinking.

Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government claims that the alcopop tax was introduced to reduce binge drinking in teenagers, but, as I have said many times, if the government were genuine in this endeavour, rather than an increase in tax focused on a preferred drink of young people, the broader issue of alcoholism in the Australian community would have been addressed.

If a tax were introduced, I would suggest a volumetric tax be put in place on alcoholic drinks, whereby drinks would be taxed according to the percentage of alcohol they contain. A low-alcohol content drink would have a low tax and would thereby be cheaper, and a high-alcohol content drink would have a high tax and would thereby be more expensive.

Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health Administration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Hear, hear!

Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you very much, Senator Cormann, for agreeing with that proposition. There is no doubt at all that alcoholism in Australia has a huge impact on our society. There is a horrendous social cost and also a huge cost to industry in this country. The social costs include: the impact on families of domestic violence, marital disharmony and breakdown; a huge cost to the social services budget in looking after people claiming social security as a result of breakdowns in marriages, unemployment; and so on. Then there are the long-term and more subtle effects such as underachieving children who are the victims of alcoholic parents and broken marriages.

As we know, there is a huge impact of alcoholism in Indigenous communities. We have read about what has been happening in the Northern Territory and in the north of Western Australia, in towns like Fitzroy Crossing, Halls Creek and Kalumburu, over the last year or so. Alcoholism is in fact wrecking those societies. I have attended three or four public meetings in Halls Creek over the years I have been in the Senate to discuss possible solutions to the problems alcohol has caused in the Indigenous population of that town. Until recently there was no good news, but when I was in Halls Creek in July I was told by the police that the ban on takeaway alcohol had resulted in a marked decrease in charges for domestic violence and assault. That is some progress but more is needed from government to solve the sad impact of alcohol on Indigenous people.

Many years ago I attended a seminar that BHP ran in Port Hedland, where alcohol was labelled the biggest drug problem in Australia and was said to cause a huge cost to industry as a result of workplace and other injuries, loss of time at work and decreased efficiency, as well as domestic and social problems outside the work environment. According to the Alcohol and Other Drugs Council of Australia, the carnage left by alcohol misuse is staggering. Statistics show that around one-third of Australians put themselves at risk of alcohol related harm—such as premature death or disability—in the short term from events such as road injury, violence and assault on at least one occasion in their lives. Almost 10 per cent of the population consumes alcohol in a manner that puts them at risk of long-term harm such as cancer, cirrhosis of the liver, cardiovascular disease, organic brain syndrome and psychiatric illness. It is estimated that nearly five per cent of the total injury and disease burden in Australia is attributable to alcohol. That in turn means that there is an enormous cost to health services. Alcohol is the major cause of drug related death among young Australians. Elevated blood alcohol levels are implicated in one-third of all road traffic accidents, which speaks for itself.

If we are to deal effectively with the problem of binge drinking and alcoholism, then the government has to be serious about finding solutions. The cost of alcohol to consumers is an important factor in curbing excessive drinking, and tax is a very significant factor in the cost of drinks. I believe that a volumetric tax is the most obvious way to use this fact in reducing the consumption of alcoholic drinks in Australian society and thereby mitigating, if not substantially reducing, the social consequences of alcoholism in Australia. Last year in Scotland, the government recognised this and announced a plan to introduce a standard price per unit of alcohol consumed in Scotland—in other words, a volumetric tax. This was done to tackle the $3.5 billion cost of alcohol abuse to the community at large in Scotland.

Similarly, in 1999, pivotal research by Curtin University of Technology in Perth, which conducted a study into cask-wine drinking patterns in the Northern Territory, found that, with the introduction of a surcharge, average consumption of alcohol was significantly reduced. The implications of that should be obvious to anyone who gives it any consideration whatsoever. The price of low-alcohol beer would be substantially lower than the price of a glass of cask wine and that in turn would significantly reduce the level of excessive drinking in our society.

Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Health Administration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

But that would require a hard decision!

Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That would require, as Senator Cormann said, a hard decision and a commitment to a socially-effective policy, which is glaringly absent in the planning of the Rudd government. Clearly that social objective is not on the radar of the Rudd government and, instead, this measure is just designed to raise revenue for the high-spending Rudd government.

The AMA has for years supported the concept of the introduction of a volumetric tax on alcohol, as has the Productivity Commission, the Australian Council of Social Service, the National Centre for Research into the Prevention of Drug Abuse, the Salvation Army and the Alcohol Advisory Council of Western Australia. The Rudd government must be aware of the positions of these bodies, of the extent of the damage alcoholism causes on an ongoing basis in the Australian community and of the need for the federal government to develop a strong, broad policy profile to counter these problems. Accordingly, I call upon the Rudd government to demonstrate some leadership in dealing with the problem and the horrendous consequences of alcohol abuse in this country.

While any serious attempt to counter the problem of alcoholism in Australia would include education, law enforcement, industry involvement and rehabilitation services, a very important part of any solution has to be the introduction of a volumetric tax on alcoholic drinks so that there is a cost incentive to encourage drinkers to move to low-alcohol drinks across the board.

Mr Acting Deputy President, I think you will agree it is a dreadful indictment of the record of the Rudd government that, while pretending to be an administration which is concerned about dealing with the social problems of the community in general and Indigenous people in particular, and in spite of the benefits it has been demonstrated a volumetric tax on alcohol would bring, no plan has been announced to introduce a volumetric tax on alcoholic drinks. For this omission the Rudd government must stand condemned for its hypocrisy.

Steve Fielding (Victoria, Family First Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today, as I rise to speak on the Excise Tariff Amendment (2009 Measures No. 1) Bill 2009 [No. 2] and the related bill, I feel a sense of deja vu and I imagine I am not alone. Today this Senate meets again to vote on a blatant tax grab that will do nothing to tackle Australia’s $16 billion alcohol toll. This is a tax grab the Rudd government has dressed up as the answer to Australia’s $16 billion binge-drinking problem. The Rudd government has surrounded this tax grab with smoke and mirrors to make the public believe it is doing something. This is the Rudd government’s showcase performance on binge drinking and it is all show and no substance. The Rudd government has spent a lot of time and effort working on this masquerade, hoping that the Australian public are gullible enough to think that a tax on one alcoholic product would halt the scourge of binge drinking in our communities. The simple fact is that a blatant tax grab on one product will do little to tackle Australia’s binge drinking problem. Australians are smart and they can see a political stunt a mile away—and that is what this is: a political stunt. Until there is a recognition by this government that we have to change the way we all think about alcohol and break that mentality of drinking to get drunk, nothing will change.

The Prime Minister has had plenty of time to deal with this issue. Back in 2007, when Mr Rudd was still only the Leader of the Opposition, I visited him in his office and warned him that Australia had a binge-drinking problem which was spiralling out of control. That was in 2007, before he was Prime Minister. I warned him that we needed to do more to tackle this problem that was impacting the very fabric of our society. This alcohol problem still accounts for around 40 per cent of police work and is the cause of one in five deaths on our roads. Forty per cent of police work is alcohol related—it is huge. I told him that we needed to do three things that were outlined clearly in my Alcohol Toll Reduction Bill 2007 [2008]. The first item in that bill was to restrict alcohol advertising and unhook alcohol from sport. The second was to put health warning labels on all alcohol products. The third was to get the advertising out of the hands of industry and into the hands of a totally independent regulatory body. However, although Mr Rudd listened, he did little.

I again visited Mr Rudd, this time when he was Prime Minister, and again alerted him to the serious issue of Australia’s alcohol toll. I again stressed the three real actions which the government could take to help address Australia’s alcohol toll. Again the government did little.

But, all of a sudden, perhaps after looking at the Treasury figures and deciding that the government needed more money for its spending spree, the Prime Minister woke up one day and decided that Australia had a drinking problem that, according to the Rudd government, could be solved by hiking up the price of one alcohol product. What a joke! Was that the best they could come up with? A blatant tax grab is not going to solve Australia’s binge-drinking problem. Australia’s alcohol toll is a genuine issue—a $16 billion drain on our economy each year. That is what it costs to mop up after binge drinking.

We need to change the culture of binge drinking to one of responsible drinking in Australia. In a survey released earlier this year, the Alcohol Education and Rehabilitation Foundation revealed that more than 80 per cent of Australians recognise that as a society we have a drinking problem and that 85 per cent of Australians want more done to fix that problem. Close to one and a half years after the alcopops tax was introduced to curb binge drinking, more Australians than ever are demanding that more be done. They want the government to stand up to the alcohol giants and put an end to the link between alcohol and sport. Paul Dillon, a drug educator with Drug and Alcohol Research and Training Australia, was right when he said in an article in the Newcastle Herald:

Alcohol and sport are tangled together so tightly in this country that it is extremely difficult to work out where one stops and the other one begins and that is exactly the way the alcohol companies like it. As a result, there are very few sports now that don’t have a drinking culture.

It is an indictment that we have allowed alcohol to become so intrinsically tied to sport. The reason for this is that the only exemption in Australia that allows alcohol ads to appear on television at any time during the day is for sporting programs. It clearly ties alcohol and sport together and this link needs to be broken. Mr Dillon went on to say in the article:

It is time for this link to be severed—not because alcohol is bad or we should not be drinking but because it sends a mixed and confusing message to the Australian public.

Let me repeat it:

It is time for this link—

between alcohol and sport—

to be severed—not because alcohol is bad or we should not be drinking but because it sends a mixed and confusing message to the Australian public.

Perhaps the Rudd government is also confused. The Rudd government must be confused if it cannot see the harmful links between alcohol and sport and the way the alcohol industry has been allowed to use its influence to target future drinkers in our young. Plenty of other people can see it. Respected social researcher Hugh Mackay, in an article in the Age, writes:

… as a society, we’ve acted as if we desperately want young people to get hooked on alcohol as quickly as possible, drink as much as they want, whenever they like, and get smashed as often as possible.

He goes on to argue:

If you want to change the way people behave, you need to make significant changes to the environment that shapes their behaviour.

We have tolerated appalling behaviour and often excuse violence on the grounds of drunkenness. In short, we have worshipped the stuff. If that is not sounding alarm bells to the Australian government, the Rudd government, whilst the best they can do is come up with a blatant tax grab that they hide behind, claiming that it is going to tackle binge drinking, then they are just crazy.

When you think about it, haven’t we just allowed this to happen, the way that alcohol is worshipped? Haven’t we all laughed at someone being completely, stupidly drunk? Haven’t we all nodded knowingly at the work colleague who cannot do their work after a big drinking session from the night before? This is a tough one for us to tackle. This is us looking at ourselves in the mirror and saying, ‘Are we happy with where we are?’ Let us face it: haven’t we as a society celebrated and applauded the drunk? It is changing a little. We turn to alcohol to celebrate and commiserate, to heal and bond with others. We have to question this. As Hugh Mackay so aptly says, we have raised alcohol to a status in our society that it does not deserve. By linking alcohol with sport, the government is normalising, sanitising and glamorising alcohol for future generations. This is our future, our kids, and we are allowing alcohol to be tied with sport in such a way that it sanitises, glamorises and normalises alcohol to our kids. If it was not so serious, it would be a sad joke.

But now we are seeing the nasty side of alcohol abuse: the wave of excessive violence in our streets, the glass used as a weapon to cut and scar, the beatings and bashings that stain our streets and our homes with blood. Binge drinking robs our society to the tune of $16 billion a year, and also inflicts an enormous emotional cost—splitting families apart and destroying relationships. It has been a year and a half since the alcopops tax grab has been in place, a tax the government promised would address binge drinking. It has clearly failed. The Brumby Labor government had to hold an emergency summit in April because the alcohol-fuelled violence in Melbourne was spiralling out of control. That is a bit odd, isn’t it? At that stage the alcopops tax had been in place for one year. So if the alcopops tax that had been in place for over a year was working in curbing binge drinking, why the need for an emergency summit? Because the $16 billion alcohol toll is not a tax problem, it is a cultural problem.

If the alcopops tax was really effective in preventing binge drinking, sales of alcopops would not have increased by 12 per cent in the three months to the end of June. If the tax hike was truly the magic elixir to solve Australia’s alcohol problem, the initial drop in alcopops sales, which occurred following the introduction of the tax, would not have been absorbed by increasing sales in other liquor categories. Our response to Australia’s alcohol abuse epidemic must be more than just a blatant tax grab on alcopops. It is like hitting a giant with a feather. The core change that the Rudd government must address is helping Australians to make the shift away from celebrating getting drunk and from tolerating the mayhem it unleashes on our society to one that refuses to tolerate a binge-drinking culture.

A significant way to break the culture of future generations is to cut the supply line between alcohol and sport. That is a biggie, isn’t it? I have spoken to the health minister, to the Treasurer and to the Prime Minister about removing alcohol advertisements during family viewing times before 9 pm, which would stop these alcohol ads from being shown during sports programs. I have again explained that I realise this will have to be a process that is phased in to accommodate television programming schedules already locked in and to allow the industry to unhook itself and to adjust. That is common sense, but they would not even go there. They just refuse to stand up to the alcohol giants. Why? The simple message to the Rudd government is this: show some guts and take a stand and stop hiding behind a blatant tax grab.

The alcopops tax is a complete fizzer. The Rudd government must make this important change and draw that important line in the sand and say, ‘That’s enough; enough is enough.’ Only yesterday it was revealed in the Australian that the Department of Health and Ageing had sought advice on the alcopops tax from the National Centre for Education and Training on Addiction. This national centre told the government that it needed to do more than simply increase taxes on alcopops if it was serious about addressing the problem of binge drinking in our society. It is no surprise the government decided to still not release the full report from the national centre.

I have one last thought. Picture this: you are alone at home with your young children watching football on television. The doorbell rings. A man stands at the door with his arms laden with alcohol products. He says he is there to sit with your children. He is dressed in sporting gear. He assures you that the children cannot drink the products he has with him but they can look as much as they like. Would you invite him in to sit on your couch next to your children? That is what you are allowing to happen by allowing the alcohol advertising to continue during sports programming. I ask senators to think about their vote on this issue and to stand up to the government and say, ‘You have got to do more than a blatant tax grab to address Australia’s $16 billion drinking problem.’

Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank all the senators who have made contributions to this debate on the Excise Tariff Amendment (2009 Measures No. 1) Bill 2009 [No. 2] and the Customs Tariff Amendment (2009 Measures No. 1) Bill 2009 [No. 2]. In particular, I would like to take the opportunity to thank Senator Xenophon and the Greens senators for their constructive contributions to this important debate and their proactive negotiations. I would also like to thank Senator Fielding. I think it goes without saying that he has had a longstanding commitment to anti-binge drinking measures.

The Excise Tariff Amendment (2009 Measures No. 1) Bill and the Customs Tariff Amendment (2009 Measures No. 1) Bill increase the rate of excise and excise equivalent customs duties in the Excise Tariff Act 1921 and the Customs Tariff Act 1995 on beverages commonly referred to as alcopops from $39.36 per litre of alcohol content to $66.67 per litre of alcohol content, with effect on and from 27 April 2008. This rate is subject to biannual indexation and is increased in February and August each year. As at 1 August 2009, the rate applicable to alcopops is $69.57.

While the opposition no longer opposes the legislation, it has continued to question the impact of this measure. Yet this measure has been widely backed by health experts, by police and by the community. The measure has reduced the consumption of alcopops and spirits. Alcopops clearances fell by around 35 per cent over the period of May 2008 to April 2009 compared with the previous year. Overall, even after some substitution, spirit clearances have dropped by eight per cent over the same period. There is still a decline, even taking into account beer consumption. This year’s budget papers show average weekly beer and spirit clearances dropped by 0.5 per cent. If you put it in terms of litres, it is about 9,000 litres of alcohol in the period between May 2008 to March 2009 compared with the same period between 2007 and 2008. On this measure this equates to about 720,000 fewer standard drinks being consumed per week on average.

I think it is useful to correct a few misconceptions that have been raised about this alcopops measure. First, the measure closes a loophole opened up by the former coalition government where alcopops are taxed at a lower rate than other spirits. Alcopops will now be taxed at the same rate as other spirits—not more, not less. This is what we mean by closing the loophole. Second, the alcopops measure was never at any time a standalone initiative, as some opposition members have—and I suggest disingenuously—suggested. Binge drinking is a long-term issue which requires sustained long-term action. Experts agree that to effectively tackle binge drinking we need to have a multipronged and prolonged strategy. There is no serious argument against this proposition. So, when you hear people say that this measure of itself has not fixed a binge drinking culture built up over many decades within a few short months, we know they are simply being, quite frankly, glib.

Cultural change takes a long time to occur and I look forward to seeing the findings of the Preventative Health Taskforce, which has preventing alcohol related harm as one of its three priorities. I am sure the Minister for Health and Ageing, Ms Roxon, would also be pleased to see those results as well. On top of this, as long ago as March 2008, the Prime Minister and the Minister for Health and Ageing announced the National Binge Drinking Strategy. This involved investing $53.5 million to address binge drinking among young people. By tackling the issue on many fronts we aim to make inroads into behaviour, particularly amongst young people.

Thirdly, I would like to address the issue of substitution. This argument runs that, if the price of alcopops has increased incidentally by taxing them at the same rate as full strength spirits, young people will substitute their drinking to full strength spirits and mix their own drinks. Whilst there has been some substitution to full strength spirits, partly driven by the marketing strategies of alcopops sellers, overall there was a fall in total spirit excise and equivalent customs duty clearance of around eight per cent, as I mentioned earlier.

Earlier I thanked the Greens senators and Senator Xenophon, and I can confirm that the written commitment by the Minister for Health and Ageing to a $50 million package of important anti-binge drinking measures will be honoured if these bills are passed unamended. The bills also alter the taxation definition of beer and grape wine in the Excise Tariff Act 1921 and the Customs Tariff Act 1995 to ensure beer and grape wine products that attempt to mimic spirit based products in their taste are taxed as a spirit product. Changes to the A New Tax System (Wine Equalisation Tax) Regulations 2000 will follow, if these bills are passed by parliament, to ensure domestically produced grape wine products are taxed on a comparable basis to imported grape wine products. I thank all those who have contributed to the debate, as I indicated earlier. It has been a long debate over quite some time as opposed to taking up the time of the Senate. I urge the Senate to pass the amending bills, which are essentially a part of the government’s measure to address binge drinking.

Question agreed to.

Steve Fielding (Victoria, Family First Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—Mr Acting Deputy President, I ask that my name be recorded as being opposed.

Mark Bishop (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is so noted, Senator.

Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—It is quite obvious that the National Party, and I am representing Senators Nash, Williams and Boswell, were not supporting the alcopops tax. We have been consistent on that. We made a commitment to the people of Bundaberg that we see it—and this is evident to them—as no more than another tax grab. It is not going to change the health of teenagers. We have a great issue with the idea that the world is getting warmer, so tax people, and teenagers drink too much, so put out another tax. This is a form of politics that we do not agree with. We have been consistent with our obligations and the commitments we have made to those senators here. I thank the Senate.

Steve Fielding (Victoria, Family First Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—Mr Acting Deputy President, I do not want to take the issue too much further but I certainly heard two noes before and I have just heard a statement by a senator who voted no. I think we should have the vote again if there is another no added to mine.

The Acting Deputy President:

Senator, the issue is the number of voices calling and that is in the hearing of the chair. I deliberately watched you and your colleagues down at that end of the chamber to note the number of voices that called. I heard one and I saw only one mouth move. The ruling stands, thank you, Senator.

Bills read a second time.