Hansard debates

Mr McGUIRE (Broadmeadows) (12:04:17): Every cigarette does you harm. Such medical evidence is long established, but it remains staggering to realise that even today in Victoria smoking is still the leading cause of preventable chronic disease and death, with about 4000 lives lost annually. Smoking also costs $3.8 billion in health care and lost productivity each year. This is the scale of what we are talking about. What do we have to do now? We have to continue to adapt to the changing tactics of big tobacco companies and the way that they relentlessly try to hook new customers, often young and naive people. This is the strategy. It has been well established and identified, and we need to keep moving on how we address their tactics and their changes. The World Health Organization has urged governments to enforce bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship at sporting events, including when hosting or receiving broadcasts of Formula One and Moto GP events. The World Health Organization also urged all sporting bodies, including Formula One and Moto GP, to adopt strong tobacco-free policies to ensure their events are smoke-free and their activities and participants, including race teams, are not sponsored by tobacco companies. These calls come in light of tobacco companies establishing new partnerships with motor racing teams. Just to identify this clearly, British American Tobacco recently announced 'a new global partnership’ with the Formula One team McLaren, using the logo 'A better tomorrow’. In making this announcement, BAT indicated that the multi-year partnership will provide a global platform to drive greater resonance of certain products. This statement suggests that the company’s intent is to promote tobacco use. Of course it is. They are like mobile billboards. That is the strategy. That is what they are doing. In the case of Philip Morris International, the company has created a new logo, 'Mission Winnow’, to be carried by Ferrari on cars and Ducati on motorbikes that previously carried branding for the cigarette brand Marlboro. PMI has also registered the Mission Winnow logo as a trademark, including for use with respect to tobacco products. Ducati carried this branding at a recent Moto GP. Comprehensive bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship reduce the consumption of tobacco products, including among young people. This is what the World Health Organization has defined. Article 13 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control obliges parties to the convention to implement a comprehensive ban or restrictions on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship. The definitions of 'tobacco advertising and promotion’ and 'tobacco sponsorship’ are broad and cover activities with the effect or likely effect of promoting a tobacco product or tobacco use either directly or indirectly. The actions of the companies result in advertisement and promotion of tobacco products and tobacco use to the world at large, including young people. This is the hook. This is the new generation of customers they are trying to entice. Tobacco product advertising and promotion occurs both in countries that host events and in countries that receive transmissions of these events. The World Health Organization urged governments to implement their domestic laws banning tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship in the strongest possible ways. This is their statement. This may include issuing penalties applicable under domestic laws and taking preventative action, such as by preventing the screening of events that violate domestic laws. This is the set of circumstances that we find ourselves in. With the issue of e-cigarettes, I will reference the Surgeon General of the US, who has said that he is emphasising: … the importance of protecting our children from a lifetime of nicotine addiction and associated health risks by immediately addressing the epidemic of youth e-cigarette use. The recent surge in e-cigarette use among youth, which has been fuelled by new types of e-cigarettes that have recently entered the market, is a cause for great concern. We must take action now to protect the health of our nation’s young people. This is from the Surgeon General of the US. These are the established methods that we know, the strategies that occur, and that is why the Andrews Labor government is again upholding a fine tradition in Victoria. It has been for more than three decades. I do want to commend the then health minister, David White, who was the driver of this strategy. Nigel Gray from the Anti-Cancer Council of Victoria was also an outstanding advocate, and he made this an international quest as well. It was done in a bipartisan way. Mark Birrell did play an important role in the upper house to get the Liberal Party, the coalition, over the line, so it was actually tripartisan at that time. Victoria was an international exemplar in this. So this continues a long line of tradition on standing up and really identifying the health risks. I do also want to acknowledge Tom Roper, another Labor health minister, for what he did, and Nicola Roxon, as the federal health minister, in taking on the branding issue again. That became an internationally contested argument. A lot of money was spent by big tobacco, and that has been a long hard fight. This goes to one of the real values in health that has been driven and led out of Victoria and has saved lives around the world, so I want to really commend that effort. What are we doing here? This again ensures that overseas-based Formula One teams will not display tobacco advertising on their cars and uniforms at the Formula One Australian Grand Prix. So again, that is upholding the tradition and then countering the changing circumstances and the cynical manipulation that tobacco companies drive to try and hook the next generation of users. This legislation will make it impossible for tobacco companies to circumvent the laws when they try to introduce new forms of advertising and sponsorship, especially in sport. The legislation extends the definition of tobacco or e-cigarette advertising to include words or designs closely associated with a tobacco manufacturer. It is designed to crack down on this cynical manipulation that big tobacco use to circumvent the rules by identifying new and indirect ways of marketing their dangerous and—let us call it—deadly products. That is what they are. The legislation will also repeal a rarely used exemption for tobacco advertising at certain events, making it non-negotiable that tobacco advertising is banned for good. This is really part of an outstanding tradition that we have in defining the values that have been supported right across the Parliament. I do want to acknowledge the Greens political party and the contribution today from the member for Brunswick in supporting this as well. There is that need for vigilance. There is that need to keep watching what is going on and to keep countering argument by argument what big tobacco companies keep putting up, because the bottom line remains the same: they are in it for the money, and the cost is incredible in lives. Still in Victoria 4000 lives are lost each year; this is the most preventable loss of life we have in our state. And then in productivity and healthcare costs it is nearly $4 billion. So even though we do have a proud history, that shows us that we must keep evolving. We must be vigilant and we must adapt and counter the cynicism of big tobacco, because they know as well as anybody else that every cigarette does you harm. I commend this bill to the house.