Cut The Smoking!
This week in Parliament there was an excellent debate on the Act to rid all bars, clubs and pubs of cigarette smoke. In my contribution to the debate I said:
“The Smoke-free Environment Act prohibits smoking in an enclosed public place but contains certain exemptions in relation to a hotel, club, nightclub or casino. The purpose of the bill is to phase out those exemptions by 1 July 2007. That three year phasing in period will increase the number of deaths caused by tobacco.
Evidence suggests there are 14 deaths every single day as a result of tobacco-related diseases, and the Government is proposing that for the next 950 days we turn a blind eye to such. Therefore, 14,000 dead people is the cost of this legislation. Unless we amend it. Does the Government not care for these 14,000 people. Does the Government thinks it willo take Australians three years to learn they cannot smoke inside?
Smoking will continue to be permitted in private gaming rooms of casinos after that date, and this exemption will be regularly reviewed by the Minister for Health. As though that might improve the situation!
The exemption safeguards the casino’s income and the payment of levies to the Government but it does nothing to safeguard the health of workers who have to work in smoke-filled environments. Casino workers now know what their lives and suffering are worth. Their lives, and the suffering that might be caused by passive smoking, is the amount of the levy paid to the Government by the casino!
I also disagree with the provisions that deal with the removal of the right of a person to be compensated by the Crown for any loss that a person may have suffered by the matters specified in the casino exemption provisions.
Yet in his second reading speech the Minister stated: “Several compelling reasons shape the decision to bring in further smoking bans … A plethora of eminent research bodies and health bodies have affirmed that passive smoking causes harm … There have been 20 successful Australian prosecutions for passive smoking in the workplace.”
The Minister continued: “Tobacco-related illnesses account for 54,000 hospital admissions annually at a cost of $180 million per annum or $500,000 per day …
The initiatives in the bill will serve to curb the adverse health effects suffered by many people who work in areas where people frequently smoke. They will also be a welcome relief to those who frequent areas where people habitually smoke. I welcome those initiatives, although I remain deeply concerned for those who must continue to work in smoke-filled casinos.
The health effects of active smoking are well documented. Passive smoking is a phenomenon that has been closely considered as a source of adverse health effects arguably only in the past decade or so.
For example, in 1986, the National Health and Medical Research Council examined the issue of passive smoking and found sufficient evidence of an adverse effect on health to recommend that policies and practices be introduced to reduce exposure to passive smoking. This bill is 20 years after that report. This report is one of the many well-resourced reports on passive smoking published in the past couple of decades.
A report entitled “The Health Effects of Passive Smoking”, which was published by the council in 1997–10 years after the report I just referred to-found that “the scientific evidence reviewed has found positive associations between passive smoking and the following diseases: asthma in children, lower respiratory illnesses and, lung cancer, major coronary events and other illnesses.” It found also:
On the basis of 48 studies of the relationship between passive smoking and asthma, children exposed to environmental tobacco smoke are estimated to be about 1.4 times as likely to suffer from asthma symptoms as children who are not exposed. Passive smoking also aggravates pre-existing asthma in children. It is estimated that in Australia about 8% of childhood asthma-or 46,500 Australian children-is attributable to passive smoking.
That is mainly from their parents. The report continued:
The effect is most marked in children of mothers who smoke heavily (more than 10 cigarettes/day). It is likely that there is an effect on asthma due to lower levels of smoking but this has not been included in the burden of illness estimates.
The report continued further:
On the basis of 25 studies, it is estimated that the risk of lower respiratory illnesses (such as croup, bronchitis, bronchiolitis and pneumonia) is about 60% higher in children exposed to environmental tobacco smoke during the first eighteen months of life … In addition, a number of studies have reported a positive association with lower respiratory illness in older children, but the conservative assumption was made that the effect ended at 18 months of age. On this basis, it is estimated that about 13% of lower respiratory illness in Australian children under 18 months of age is due to passive smoking.
This is due to inhaling air from smoking parents. In relation to lung cancer, the report found: Estimating the risk of lung cancer in people exposed to environmental tobacco smoke is complicated by differences in the way studies have been conducted and what they have measured. On the basis of 34 studies, it is estimated that there is an increase in risk of about 30% in never-smokers who live with a smoker compared with never-smokers living with a non-smoker …
On the basis of 16 studies, it is estimated that the risk of heart attack or death from coronary heart disease is about 24 per cent higher in never-smokers who live with a smoker compared with unexposed never-smokers.
Over many years in my work among prisoners I found that almost all prisoners would light up when I began to talk to them. In my work over many years counselling psychiatric patients I found that people suffering from anxiety, depression, schizophrenia and a whole range of other mental illnesses almost inevitably light up when you start to talk to them. I was constantly exposed to passive smoking. I believe years of this have contributed to two heart attacks and five bypasses I have suffered, given that I am a never-smoker.
The report emphasised that the above estimates of burden of illness relate only to exposure at home and include only illnesses in never-smokers. The scientific proof and evidence on this matter is quite overwhelming. For those reasons we would embrace any moves that will increase the prohibition on smoking in public places. I’m a great believer in civil liberties, but I don’t believe anyone has the right to poison someone else. A cigarette is a little toxic waste dump on fire, dangling from your lips.
The bill progressively narrows the exemptions that licensed premises can seek and under which they can operate from 1 January 2005 until 30 June 2007. On 1 July all areas in licensed premises, except casino private gaming areas, are to be smoke free. I note that this date is after the next State election. It seems to be a tacit indication that the Government expects reaction from the casinos, the pubs, the clubs and others, and expects the Coalition will then have to deal with it
Honourable members can be assured that the report that is to be presented on 1 January each year for examination by the Minister for Health will have been written in a haze of smoke. There is also a significant issue relating to the retrospectivity of the compensation provision, which should not be upheld.
The bill abrogates the right of a person to be compensated by or on behalf of the Crown for loss arising directly or indirectly from any proposed section 21A matter that occurred before the bill’s commencement. Of course, sometimes lung cancer and other forms of cancer take some time to develop. I am also concerned, as the committee has emphasised, that the bill will have the effect of rendering any such claims ineffective. As a result of its concerns, the committee has referred to the Parliament the question of whether the retrospective operation of the bill trespasses unduly on personal rights and liberties.
I was recently in Ireland and I read that the Irish pubs, which traditionally have been smoke filled, became no-smoking areas almost overnight. They did not have to wait three years. I was interested to see while experiencing the life and music in local pubs in Ireland that no-one smoked.
How long does it take to read a sign that reads “No smoking”? The Irish discovered that it can be read quickly.
So should Australians.
THIS IS GORDON MOYES.
