Page 3696 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 21 November 2006
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
party mix night at the Hellenic Club on 2 December 2006. The Hellenic Club has also had in-house advertising about going smoke-free.
The campaign was developed in consultation with the Smoke-Free Consultative Group, which consists of representatives from industry, including Clubs ACT, the AHA ACT Branch, and health groups, including ASH Australia and the Heart Foundation here in the ACT. It is a credit to the ACT community that these changes have broad-based support.
These bans are part of a comprehensive strategy from the ACT government to tackle smoking in our community. The government will also shortly begin compliance measures to tackle teenage smoking, recently passed by the Assembly. I, like other members, look forward to sitting in an ACT club with my family in a smoke-free environment in a few short weeks.
MS MacDONALD: Thank you, minister, for that answer. Can you update the Assembly on the compliance testing?
MS GALLAGHER: I thank Ms MacDonald for her supplementary question. In the ACT, the most common age to begin smoking is between the ages of 15 and 16 years. Early uptake of smoking is associated often with heavier smoking, a lesser likelihood of quitting and higher probability of succumbing to smoking-related diseases. Tobacco use by children has also been found to form part of a pattern of risk-taking behaviour. ACT data shows that students aged 16 to 17 who smoke are at a significantly greater risk of consuming alcohol, using cannabis or other illicit drugs than are non-smoking students of the same age.
With all that in mind, we cannot stand idly by. In the face of these facts, delaying the uptake of smoking, as well as discouraging it entirely, is a major public health goal. Research has shown that if a person does not use tobacco regularly by the age of 18 there is only a small chance that he or she will ever do so. There is mounting evidence from Australia and overseas that the availability of cigarettes—in fact, purchasing cigarettes—is a factor in children progressing from experimental smoking to regular smoking.
The Assembly recently passed measures to introduce compliance testing, a tool to measure compliance of the tobacco retailers in relation to the sales to minors provision of the Tobacco Act. It involves training young volunteers, under the supervision of an authorised officer, attempting to purchase cigarettes or other smoking products from retail outlets.
Since being passed by the Assembly, compliance-testing provisions are now contained in part 6A of the Tobacco Act. While these provisions are effective and operational, from a practical perspective they cannot be used yet. This is because, under section 42D, the minister must first approve the compliance testing procedures through a disallowable instrument. We are currently developing these procedures, with input from the Office of Children, Youth and Family Support, along with the Department of Justice and Community Safety.
These procedures will include requirements for the young person’s appearance, how the cigarettes are requested and how the young person responds if asked for proof of age.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .