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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 5 Hansard (15 May) . . Page.. 1553 ..

MR BERRY (6.21): Mr Speaker, to us it does not matter whether it is 30 per cent, 33 per cent or 25 per cent. The notion of these areas is just silly, because they will have no effect in relation to preventing the inhalation of somebody else's tobacco smoke. I would like to refer to another point that Mrs Carnell made. I think she said that I would "bring the industry". I am not as narrow-minded as that. What I have always said - if my recollection is correct - is "bring the community with me". That includes the industry. You do not focus on just business and just the industry. What we have to talk about is the effects on workers here. Mrs Carnell also made a point in relation to my comments about bringing the community with us and in relation to smoke-free workplaces. I said that workplaces would have been smoke free within three years if Labor had had its way. That is what the smoke-free workplaces code of practice developed by the Occupational Health and Safety Council argues for. Certainly, Labor would have stood behind that code, to make sure that workers were not affected by the smoke of other people.

Mr Osborne made the point again in relation to the air-handling equipment in clubs and so on. Aside from the fact that air-handling equipment does not guarantee that you will not be affected by somebody else's smoke, it was always seen as an expensive option for the well-off premises. This legislation makes it easier for the well-off premises to compete on a very unlevel playing field. Because they have resources, because they can borrow money and because they have money, they can install these things. I do not think any of my clubs - I am a member of several - were too happy about the requirement to put in this sort of air-handling equipment. I certainly know that the board of the Labor Club would have preferred it if I had never talked about smoking, because it was not something that they particularly wanted to change in the Labor Club. But we had a principled policy position that we intended to pursue, and I think anybody who stands in the way of it deserves to be roundly criticised.

It is, essentially, about providing a safer place for workers. That is what it gets back to. That is why this workplaces code of practice was developed. While ever we ignore the interests of workers, I do not think we are a very humane society. What will happen if we adopt these sorts of standards and silly extensions? This is not a transition; this is a second transition. The first one was for 21/2 years, or two years and nine months - nearly three years - and the next one is for 18 months. What happens next?

This is not a Government or an Assembly that is leading the country in relation to the development of safer places for workers and changing the culture of tobacco consumption. It, in fact, is fostering it. That is why, as the Opposition spokesperson on health, I have always maintained the view that sometimes you have to observe principles instead of favouring vote-grabbing impressions that you might wish to create.

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