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Further implications
It is difficult to determine whether the Public Health Amendment (Prevention of Sale of Smoking Products to Underage Persons) Bill will be passed by the Tasmanian Parliament in March 2021.
At the end of 9015, a similar Bill had been proposed in Tasmania. By July 2016, the Tasmanian government had decided not to proceed with it. Tasmania's then Health Minister, Michael Ferguson, stated, 'As I said at the time we released the proposal for consultation, it is a challenging proposal involving a balance of preserving individual adult rights and freedom of choice with the desire to reduce youth smoking...
We have consulted widely on the concept after having included it in the Healthy Tasmania Consultation Draft and have come to the view that it is not an appropriate response at this time.'
Then, as now, the proposal had been opposed by civil liberties groups and by the business community. This time the government has been careful to argue that the prohibition would have limited impact on small businesses selling cigarettes. Kathryn Barnsley, a spokesperson for Smoke Free Tasmania has claimed that studies have shown that most young people buy cigarettes from supermarket, which means that the proposed change in the law would not affect small businesses significantly.
Again, however, the Tasmanian Small Business Council does not accept the proposal to lift the legal smoking age. The chief executive officer of the Council, Robert Mallet, has stated, 'I know for a fact that everybody under the age of 18 gets [tobacco] from family and friends and that is not going to change.'
Mr Mallet further stated, 'Lifting the legal smoking age to 21, and demonising small businesses who already do the right thing by not selling cigarettes to young people, won't [stop some young people smoking]. More controversially, Mallet has suggested that a more effective means of reducing smoking among all ages would be to make e-cigarettes more readily available. Mallet has stated, 'Australia is one of the few places in the world not to have regulated and legalised its use which is a crying shame because harm reduction experts throughout the world recognise that vaping a nicotine liquid is significantly less harmful than burning tobacco paper and smoking it through a filter.'
Mr Mallet has stated further, 'Regulation of the sale and use of smoke-free products in Tasmania would allow responsible local small retailers that already sell tobacco products in to reduce their sales of traditional cigarettes, without negatively affecting their economic viability.'
The recent federal legislation in the United States lifting the smoking age across the country to 21 seems to have emboldened Tasmania's politicians to reconsider the Tasmanian proposal. This time there does not appear to have been the same degree of community consultation as occurred in 2015-2016. There now seems to be a general belief that the issues have already been well canvassed both among parliamentarians and within the general community. Leader of Government Business in the Legislative Council, Leonie Hiscutt, said the government supported the motion, citing the fact that Tasmania remains above the national average for smoking rates.
Whatever the outcome, there seems to be a general desire for the Bill to be put before the parliament. Robert Mallett said the bill needed to be brought on for debate as soon as possible to remove uncertainty from the retail sector.
It will be interesting to see whether the Tasmanian Small Business Council will attempt to have the state liberalise its approach to e-cigarettes, irrespective of what becomes of the bill to lift the smoking age.Should Tasmania decide to raise the smoking age to 21, the next question will be whether other states will follow its lead. The long-term success of this proposal both in Tasmania and across Australia will in part depend on whether lifting the smoking age in the United States delivers the reduction in smoking rates that have been promised.