Wednesday, 11 September 2024

Public Accounts and Estimates Committee

Inquiry into Vaping and Tobacco Controls

Mathew HILAKARI (Point Cook) (10:57): Cometh the moment, cometh the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee report of course. I rise to speak on the vaping and tobacco controls inquiry report that has just been delivered to the Parliament in the last sitting weeks by the member for Laverton, who spoke on this matter, and the member for Cranbourne, who also spoke on this matter as well. This report is about as timely as it could be. It was set out in February of this year that we would undertake this inquiry as a committee, and the reason is that 4000 people every year have either premature death or disease as a result of smoking. It is the leading cause of premature death and disease in this state. This is why it is an absolute imperative that this matter be discussed by this Parliament and also by this committee.

This committee delivered 27 recommendations after 115 written submissions. We went all across the state to talk about these matters, including up to Shepparton, which was a terrific day with the students and business owners up there who described the regional impacts as well as the suburban impacts that so many members know of.

In terms of the effect that we have had on smoking in Victoria and Australia, it has been massive. Over the last two decades we have more than halved the rate of people who are smoking and that is an extraordinary effort, but we should not ever rest on our laurels. It has been taken down from 22.1 per cent in 2001 to just 9.2 per cent today, but we have a real challenge in front of us and that is vaping. We know that young people particularly are taking up vaping at terrible rates, and one of the things that really struck me from one of the students who spoke to us was both terrible and gave some signs for hope. They were talking about how people as young as 10 or even younger are undertaking vaping, but they said by the time they have reached their VCE years, many people had started to shift away from it because of the uncool nature of it. So there is a little bit of hope there. There is a glimmer of hope in amongst something that is quite terrible – people under the age of 10 undertaking vaping.

We have VicHealth in the Parliament this week with their exhibition, and it is so great to see them with peer-to-peer vaping engagement with young people. One of those things that young people called for is co-design and engagement from other young people. So I am very glad, and I hope that they continue with their excellent efforts – efforts that were already underway while this inquiry was underway.

In fact there were a number of changes that occurred while this inquiry was underway, which included the government announcing that we would be setting out a licensing system for tobacco sales, and this inquiry goes to the heart of some of those recommendations on what the government could take up. That was part of the reason in fact that the committee took a view of bringing forward the committee report, to make sure that we could take Victorians’ views – those people who had made submissions ‍– and make sure they are incorporated into the government’s views. In particular I want to talk to the Better Regulation Victoria recommendations, which landed before this report. Some of the recommendations about a licensing scheme and how we could learn from other states included making licence fees akin to those charged in Tasmania. We should learn when other states do things well. A licensing regime – we are the last state to put one into effect. We need to do it urgently, but we can also learn from those good practices and those poor practices from interstate and overseas, which this report delves into.

We put forward that a number of licences should be restricted in terms of their granting and that density limits should exist in local government areas. We particularly see those people in socio-economically deprived areas have more smoking venues and more places where you can purchase cigarettes. It also outlines that we should be restricting cigarettes from being sold within 150 metres of schools, a very sensible recommendation. And also that data be kept, because we do not actually know the extent of the problem – data on how much is sold, where it is sold and the stores that it is available at. All of these are important pieces of information that will help our public health services know what is working for them and places that they need to be more engaged with. It sets out targets and timeframes. It also sets out, as the member for Laverton said, a recommendation of a standalone regulatory agency within the Department of Justice and Community Safety. Local councils are not up to the task and not able to take on this task. I encourage the government to take a fantastic read of this great report, and I look forward to their response.