Page 2589 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 14 October 1992
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That was in 1991. It is now over 12 months later. Unfortunately, health is definitely not one of the Government's more proactive areas. We are still waiting for some action to be taken. Other States have made progress in introducing scheduling by reference. To be fair, we are not the slowest State in this respect; but we certainly have some catching up to do.
Queensland adopted recognition of the standard uniform scheduling of drugs and poisons last year - in fact, on 9 November. New South Wales adopted the legislation necessary as far back as 1987. Victoria originally adopted amendments to its Poisons and Controlled Substances Act in 1990. Unfortunately, further amendments needed to be introduced and were introduced in June this year.
Mr De Domenico: Even by Mrs Kirner.
MRS CARNELL: Even with an election coming up.
Mr De Domenico: Remember her?
MRS CARNELL: Yes. South Australia gazetted the changes necessary on 24 January last year. We in the ACT still do not have a Bill in front of the Assembly. In May, after much frustration in this area, I asked for a private members Bill to be drafted, in an attempt to introduce scheduling by reference before 1 August 1992. I was told that the Government already had a Bill in drafting and the Government's Bill had priority. "Good", I thought, "The Bill will be in place before 1 August so that ACT residents will be able to take advantage of the rescheduling of a number of drugs, one in particular being an antihistamine called hismanal".
Hismanal is the only available 24-hour acting, non-sedating antihistamine. It was made available over the counter in New South Wales, Queensland and South Australia from 1 August. In Queanbeyan, a box of 10 of these tablets costs approximately $6 less than the same box in the ACT and, as well as this, ACT consumers have to go to the doctor. This is not the first time this has happened. This has been an ongoing problem over the years for ACT consumers, and it is totally unnecessary. There is no doubt that it disadvantages Canberra consumers. Obviously, Mr Berry's own department thought the changes would have been introduced in time when they wrote on page 58 in the explanatory notes on health for the Estimates Committee that amendments to the poisons and drug legislation placed the ACT in accordance with the agreed NHMRC recommendations - a statement which, of course, is not true. In the Estimates Committee we had some other interesting information presented when Parliamentary Counsel stated that there was no hold-up in legislation that was with them. So, where does the problem lie? The problem must lie either in Cabinet or, alternatively, with Mr Berry directly. As I have said, all States and Territories recognise the benefit of conforming to the NHMRC standard.
There are two ways to introduce legislation by the simple drafting that has been used in other places. The first way is to introduce automatic or ambulatory references which will update the poisons list in accordance with national standards from time to time - for example, on 1 January and 1 July, to pick two arbitrary dates. The second and by far the best way is to simply make our poisons list identical with NHMRC standards. Whatever changes they make to
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