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Re: Letter To My Fellow Representatives

ACE: This is the response I got from the Minister of Health during the debate about my motion to disallow the proposed 75:25 smoking regulations.

(The parts in bold are my thoughts on the feedback I received from representatives of the so-called major parties)

From Hansard

The Hon. JOHN HATZISTERGOS (Minister for Health) [4.00 p.m.]: "I speak against the disallowance motion. I state at the outset that although I appreciate the interest and passion with which members have
addressed the debate in general, particularly members of the crossbench, some of the comments of Sylvia Hale were offensive, not only to the Government but to other individuals, particularly those in relation to Mr Thorpe, who is not a member of this House. She cast aspersions on him that were totally unjustified.

Anyone who was following the debate would be aware that the position of the Australian Hotels Association [AHA], as communicated to my colleague Frank Sartor, the Minister assisting me in cancer, was that
it did not insist on the definition. The debate was not about the hotels per se but more about concerns by the club industry that resulted in the Government deciding that it was better to be more definitive on what constitutes an enclosed space. That is what the
regulation does. We could have left the situation to be determined by the courts from 1 July, when the new laws come into force, but for greater certainty and to respond to genuine concerns from participants other than Mr Thorpe, the Government decided to move in
this direction."

ACE: This bit is my favourite, because the regulations make it less clear rather than more clear. Very Ironic.

The Hon. JOHN HATZISTERGOS (Minister for Health): :"From 1 July smoking will not be allowed in enclosed licensed premises. It will be permitted in outdoor areas, balconies and beer gardens. The precise definition of outdoor areas is that at least 25 per cent of the
notional wall and ceiling level must be open to the outside. Also, at least 10 per cent must be permanently open to the elements while the remainder can be comprised of doors and windows, but these must
locked open for the duration of trading and must not be closable by patrons."

ACE: You see? This is how the Minister for Health defines an outdoor area. It's a joke!

The Hon. JOHN HATZISTERGOS (Minister for Health):"New South Wales is not alone in bringing in new definitions for outdoor areas. Similar rules have been introduced in every State and Territory, with the
exception of the Northern Territory. I am advised that the New South Wales regulation is similar to those that exist in both Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory. It was the subject of extensive
consultation between many stakeholders. The result is a workable middle ground between proposals from health groups and those of industry. The regulation allows smoking in bona fide outdoor areas while preventing the construction of internal smoking rooms.

I remind honourable members that there is no such thing as a safe level of exposure to tobacco smoke, and the regulation does not attempt to set such a level. It is important to note that nothing in the Act or regulation abrogates an employer's occupational health and safety responsibilities. That is specifically preserved.

Much of the discussion about the effects on bar staff overlooks the fact that the Act does not abrogate the obligations of an employer under the occupational health and safety legislation. Honourable members would be aware that in previous cases workers have been awarded compensation arising from events during which they were exposed to environmental tobacco smoke."

ACE: All very well if you don't mind getting the cancer and thenspending several years fighting for compensation...THEN he says…..

The Hon. JOHN HATZISTERGOS (Minister for Health):"The clear message is that the only way to protect workers and patrons is to ban smoking altogether. That is why we have enacted the legislation to be more definitive and precise about what constitutes an enclosed area. We have included this regulation, which is in response to industry concerns, but it still does not abrogate the health obligations on people who allow smoking in particular areas."

ACE: I ask you....Well, that takes care of the Labor party. And here's the word from the Opposition...

The Hon. JENNIFER GARDINER [4.05 p.m.]:
"The Hon. Dr Arthur Chesterfield-Evans has moved a motion to disallow the Smoke-free Environment Amendment (Enclosed Places) Regulation 2006. The
Opposition believes that debate on designated smoking areas in clubs and hotels in this State has been extensively canvassed in the public domain, leading to gazettal of this regulation.

Following consultation on the disallowance motion I inform the House, as the Hon. Dr Arthur Chesterfield-Evans intimated at the beginning of the debate, that the Opposition does not support the motion. The regulation provides a reasonable definition of an enclosed area and balances the competing interests of participants in this important debate."

ACE: There you have it. The Liberal party apparently believe that there can be a competing interest between the interests of the NSW population and other undisclosed 'participants'. Big Tobacco sure got their money's worth! Here’s my reply:

"I thank the crossbench members for their sensible and constructive comments, and I criticise the Government and the Opposition for their cowardice and their weasel words. Fifty-five years ago smoking was shown to cause lung cancer. Twenty-eight years ago when I was registrar at Port Kembla Hospital, I amputated a man's leg because his peripheral vascular disease graft had failed. He sat in the intensive care unit. He, of course, had a bad heart and bad lungs, also because of smoking. He sat there with his oxygen mask on and I
said to him, "Look, mate. If you don't stop smoking I am going to have to chop off the other leg." He said, "All you doctors go on about smoking. If it was so bad the government would do something about it."

In essence, that is the way a lot of people think. The lack of government action has normalised what is a crazy habit. The health groups set themselves modest targets. They say they are doing really well by reducing smoking by 1 per cent per year. If 20 per cent of
the population was not wearing seat belts, would we say, "We are doing really well. The number of people wearing seat belts went up by one per cent per year and the number not wearing them went down by one per cent a year." Of course we wouldn't. We should have a decent campaign and do something. We could cut it by one-third each year, easily, if someone put some effort into it.

Twenty-five years ago I was surgical registrar at Royal North Shore Hospital. I had a 37-year-old patient with a mouth cancer at the back of his tongue. A visiting professor from Edinburgh operated on the patient with us and brought a graft with a piece of skin from his
shoulder up on a muscle flap of his pectoral muscle to replace the hole in his mouth. When you replace the floor of the mouth it is not a good replacement because it does not contract and the milky feed sits in the corner and rots. There is a smell of rotting milk so you put him in a room on his own. In his case, the flap died so there was the smell of rotting flesh as well. His 31-year-old wife and six-month-old baby stood looking at him at the end of the bed in his isolated room. The pathology came back "excision incomplete", so he
was going to die from it anyway.

Twenty five days ago, I saw a man [a non-smoker] who had recently spent three years in a pub and had cancer of the mouth. Now we have a regulation that will allow smoking in pubs forever. Forever, Minister! Forever! Not good enough!

I have had only mealy-mouth words, and pathetic arrangements and compromises since the time I graduated and learned what was going on. No-one in this Parliament cares. I have written to all members of this House and asked them for a conscience vote. It
seems that conscience votes only apply when morals are about sex.

Morals seem to be only about sex. One does not have morals about anything else. The Hon. Charlie Lynn is a good person in terms of his dislike of tobacco.

I quote from a letter he wrote on 12 April 2001
to Brendan Brady, Corporate and Regulatory Affairs Director of British American Tobacco. The letter stated:

"Dear Brendan,

Thank you for your invitation to take part in a tour of your factory to see first hand how your cigarettes are made.

I will accept your invitation to join the tour if you accept my invitation to come down to my home town in Orbost to see what cigarettes have done to my father—a TPI pensioner with emphysema.

The enclosed cigarette (which you sent me) is returned for you to stick up your…"

I will end the quote there, but the last word is what you think it is. I seek leave to table the letter.

[Leave granted.]

I do not understand why the Government would take a strong line on asbestos, why asbestos is taken seriously, and why tobacco is not. Why is it that 150 hospital admissions per day from tobacco caused
illness does not raise a ruffle with the press gallery or anyone else? We can have 6,600 deaths per year in New South Wales and no-one is concerned. We can spend $6 million from the State's coffers every
year to meet the cost of this carnage, death and human suffering, and still the Government sits there making these compromise deals on smoking forever.

We can speculate on why this is so. Let us look at
what was happening while $6 billion of this State's money was being wasted on tobacco caused disease. In 2004-05, according to the records, the Coalition received $190,705 from big tobacco companies and the Australian Hotels Association. In the same year, Labor received nothing from the tobacco companies but
received $259,704 from the Australian Hotels Association. That results in a combined total for the Liberal and Labor parties of $450,409. That is the price paid by the Government and the Opposition in the duopoly government we have in this country, where it makes no difference whether Liberal or Labor is elected because the people will not be looked after. They will be allowed to get lung cancer.

The Government will not take the lead, despite the words of the man in the intensive care ward who said that if it were serious the government would do something about it. That is the overall message when the socialisation of smoking is permitted in the fact of the Government's boast in 2004 that it would all stop in 2007.

Every time there are weasel words; every time there is a wriggle-out. That has gone on for fifty-five years and we are still counting. It is an absolute disgrace. I ask honourable members to examine their consciences and to vote according to their consciences, to make this
a moral issue and to not go along with the major parties. They are so cynical and so cheaply bought. It is such a paltry amount of money, compared with the harm that the tobacco industry does and the indifference and venality of the hoteliers.

I urge honourable members to support this motion. I thank the health groups that have done their best to support me. I only ask that honourable members examine their conscience, have the courage to do the right thing by the people who elected them and to whom they owe their primary duty, and vote for this motion.

ACE: Here's where we see where the line is drawn... ALP and Lib/Nat on one side and Democrats, Greens, Unity and Independents on the other. Here is how the vote went...

Question—That the motion be agreed to—put.

The House divided.

Ayes, 9

Mr Cohen
Ms Hale
Reverend Dr Moyes
Reverend Nile
Ms Rhiannon
Mr Tingle
Dr Wong
Mr Breen
Dr Chesterfield-Evans


Noes, 20

Ms Burnswoods
Mr Catanzariti
Mr Clarke
Mr Colless
Ms Cusack
Mr Donnelly
Ms Fazio
Miss Gardiner
Mr Hatzistergos
Mr Lynn
Mr Oldfield
Mrs Pavey
Mr Pearce
Ms Robertson
Mr Ryan
Ms Sharpe
Mr Tsang
Mr West
Mr Harwin
Mr Primrose.

Disgusted but continuing the fight,

Dr Arthur Chesterfield-Evans
M.B., B.S., F.R.C.S.(Eng.), M.Appl. Sci.(OHS), M.L.C.)"