Page 3707 - Week 12 - Thursday, 21 October 1993
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MR BERRY: There are a few who are not admitting it. Another example is the now widely available chilled ready-to-eat foods which require stringent temperature controls to maintain the safety of the food. Likewise, use-by dates and residue levels of pesticides are two other areas that were outside the scope of our outdated legislation.
The first stage of the Labor Government's reform of ACT food legislation was passed by the ACT Assembly in 1992. It provides that all food for sale in the ACT must comply with national composition, labelling and packaging standards contained in the food standards code. This has reduced the criticism levelled in the ACT that food is dumped here in the marketplace, as food must now meet the same labelling, composition and packaging standards as in other States. Even though the Act came into force only in March this year, there has been an improvement in the area of correct food labelling, with investigative work identifying certain backyard food manufacturers. For example, the public is now informed of the origin of certain types of bread, and identification of premises has enabled upgrading of hygiene standards.
The second part of the legislation, the Food (Amendment) Act 1993, was passed in August this year and provided the all-important authority to require safe food preparation and storage by the use of licensing procedures. This legislation was developed in consultation with the National Food Authority and is based on the current UK and Canadian legislation. I was keen to see modern concepts and food safety standards applied to the ACT and not just to follow the States' more outdated models. As a result, the ACT legislation provides a framework that places us years ahead of current legislation in the other Australian States. This framework is sufficiently flexible to provide protection for ACT consumers into the next century.
Codes of practice are another important part of that legislation and are currently being developed to reinforce the notice provisions contained in the Act. Under the new legislation, the ACT is now able to adopt codes of practice developed by the National Food Authority or other government bodies such as the Department of Primary Industries and Energy, while other State governments may need to amend their legislation to keep pace with modern trends and innovations. The Act also prohibits the sale of food that could be injurious to health, unfit for human consumption or contaminated with foreign matter.
The present Bill will provide a number of enforcement and administrative powers to support the previous upgraded food legislation, including the right of entry of health officers; the power to seize perished food; the power to set certain sampling procedures; the power to analyse food; and the power to examine and seize records where necessary. It also provides powers to appoint analysts, who must be persons I deem to have the appropriate qualifications to carry out the wide variety of analyses necessary to effectively enforce the food standards code. Appointments may include analysts who are not government employees, as the sampling procedures prescribed in the Bill provide for independent analyses in certain circumstances, including analyses ordered by the courts in case of dispute. Health officers are appointed by the Minister and the new name for such officers replaces the now outdated terminology of health inspector.
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