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Speaker 1: My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda

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Speaker 1: Bungelung Calcottin woman from Gadigl Country. The Daily oz acknowledges

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Speaker 1: that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the

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Speaker 1: Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres

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Speaker 1: Strate island and nations. We pay our respects to the

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Speaker 1: first peoples of these countries, both past and present.

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Speaker 2: Good morning and welcome to the Daily os. It's Wednesday,

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Speaker 2: the third of May. I'm sam, I'm zara. The government

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Speaker 2: has announced a crackdown on the flavors, colours and nicotine

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Speaker 2: levels of vapes as the federal government declares war on

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Speaker 2: e cigarettes.

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Speaker 3: In a world first that could see most e cigarettes.

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Speaker 4: Band Mark Butler says e cigarettes are creating a new

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Speaker 4: generation of nicotine addicts.

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Speaker 2: And it must end. Nicotine vapes are already illegal without

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Speaker 2: a prescription in Australia and yet they're everywhere. So what

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Speaker 2: exactly is the government planning and is it actually going

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Speaker 2: to work? We'll let you know in the deep dive,

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Speaker 2: but first the headlines.

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Speaker 4: The Reserve Bank has raised the cash rate zero point

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Speaker 4: two five percentage points so that it now sits at

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Speaker 4: three point eight five percent. That is following a board

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Speaker 4: meeting on Tuesday afternoon, Governor Phil Lowe said the decision

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Speaker 4: to increase the rate this month was quote warranted to

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Speaker 4: return to target inflation within a reasonable time frame. It

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Speaker 4: is the last cash rate decision before the federal government

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Speaker 4: hands down its budget next week.

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Speaker 2: Peter Dunnan has said the Opposition would support what he

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Speaker 2: described as sensible measures to prevent harmful vape use in Australia.

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Speaker 2: And we'll discuss what the Government's proposing in today's deep dive.

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Speaker 4: Vanessa Hudson, who is not Vanessa Hudgens, as we have

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Speaker 4: found out, will succeed Alan Joyce as the new CEO

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Speaker 4: and Managing director of Quantas. Joyce will retire at the

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Speaker 4: end of this year. Hudson has worked for Quantas since

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Speaker 4: nineteen ninety four and has served as the airline's CFO

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Speaker 4: since twenty nineteen. She will be the first female CEO

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Speaker 4: of the airline ever.

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Speaker 2: And today's good news, the first tree was planted at

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Speaker 2: a decommissioned lake turned into a nature reserve in a

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Speaker 2: regional town in far western New South Wales. The planting

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Speaker 2: is all part of a carbon offset program in the

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Speaker 2: Imperial Lakes Nature Reserve out in Broken Hill and could

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Speaker 2: be the first of hundreds of trees planted in the area. Zara.

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Speaker 2: The federal government has announced a major crackdown on vapes.

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Speaker 4: I hadn't noticed it was a big day for the

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Speaker 4: Daily Ours.

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Speaker 2: In a speech at the National Press Club yesterday, Health

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Speaker 2: Minister Mark Butler said they would be introducing restrictions the

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Speaker 2: target the so called black market in illegal vaping.

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Speaker 3: I'm all bubblegum flavors, cunicorns, no more vapes deliberately disguised

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Speaker 3: as highlighter pins for kids to be able to hide

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Speaker 3: them in their pencil cases.

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Speaker 4: I truly don't think there's been a day where I

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Speaker 4: have said a word more than yesterday speaking about vapes.

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Speaker 4: Because it's a huge announcement. So before we talk through

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Speaker 4: those changes, I think that the confusing part here is

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Speaker 4: nobody really knows what the rules are currently.

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Speaker 2: Well, it's already illegal to purchase a nicotine vape in

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Speaker 2: Australia without a medical prescription or to sell them to

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Speaker 2: someone without a prescription. But in reality we know how

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Speaker 2: common vapes are amongst young people. In a recent survey

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Speaker 2: of over one thousand Australians aged fifteen to seventeen, four

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Speaker 2: in five young people said they found it easy to

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Speaker 2: buy vapes in retail stores.

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Speaker 4: And I mean that is very clearly reflected anecdotally. Every

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Speaker 4: time we're at a party, everyone is vaping. You don't

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Speaker 4: really see cigarettes anymore at all.

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Speaker 2: Waiting for a uber on the side of the road.

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Speaker 2: You see people vaping. It's everywhere it is.

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Speaker 4: And so what are the changes going to mean moving

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Speaker 4: forward for this very clearly widespread vaping use.

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Speaker 2: Well, the key problem here, as I said, is that

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Speaker 2: vapes are really easy to come by. So what the

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Speaker 2: government is proposing is stronger regulation and enforcement of all

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Speaker 2: e cigarettes, including some new controls on their importation, contents,

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Speaker 2: and packaging. Their plan is to work with states and

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Speaker 2: territories to stamp out this vaping black market by ending

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Speaker 2: the sale of vapes in shops and convenience stores. One

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Speaker 2: of the ways they'll do that is by stopping the

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Speaker 2: importation of non prescription vapes and banning all single use

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Speaker 2: disposable vapes. Now, on top of all of that, they're

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Speaker 2: also going to restrict the flavors, colors and ingredients of vapes,

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Speaker 2: as well as some more controls of how much nicotine

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Speaker 2: is allowed in any vape.

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Speaker 4: Okay, so let's just make it very clear. Under these

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Speaker 4: new rules that Mark Butler announced yesterday, how could somebody

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Speaker 4: go about getting a vape legally?

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Speaker 2: Well, you're going to need to go to your GP,

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Speaker 2: presumably for help to manage an existing nicotine addiction. The

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Speaker 2: GP could then provide a prescription which you could feel

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Speaker 2: at a pharmacy, and they could sell you a vape

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Speaker 2: in packaging that looks like any other medicine that you

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Speaker 2: might get from the pharmacy. Now here's an interesting thing

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Speaker 2: I only discovered yesterday. According to their Health minister, only

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Speaker 2: one in twenty doctors are currently authorized to prescribe vapes.

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Speaker 2: But the government's going to remove that restriction so that

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Speaker 2: all doctors can prescribe them. And this is a really

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Speaker 2: important part of the government's strategy in managing vape addiction.

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Speaker 2: But we'll come back to that point in a second.

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Speaker 4: So this has been a very big issue for a

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Speaker 4: very long time, and it feels like the government's been

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Speaker 4: hinting about doing something. You know, we've had drops here

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Speaker 4: and there, but nothing very concrete until yesterday. Why do

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Speaker 4: you think that the government is acting on it now.

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Speaker 2: Well, the first thing to consider is that this is

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Speaker 2: a week out from the federal budget. We have a

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Speaker 2: federal budget being handed down next Tuesday, and that means

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Speaker 2: that they will attach some funding to these sorts of announcements.

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Speaker 2: But what the Health Minister Mark Butler was emphasizing at

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Speaker 2: the press Club yesterday is this sense of if the

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Speaker 2: vaping trend continues, there's an inescapable health risk that is

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Speaker 2: presenting for young people.

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Speaker 3: Big tobacco has taken another addictive product, wrapped it in

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Speaker 3: shiny packaging, added sweet flavors to create a new generation

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Speaker 3: of nicotine addicts.

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Speaker 2: Butler spoke about the fact that vapes were never meant

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Speaker 2: to be a recreational product for young people, but that.

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Speaker 3: Is what it's become. The biggest loophole I think in

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Speaker 3: Australian healthcare history.

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Speaker 2: The minister also made the point that vaping can lead

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Speaker 2: to an uptake in smoking.

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Speaker 3: So it is no wonder that under twenty fives are

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Speaker 3: the only cohort in our population that are seeing smoking

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Speaker 3: rates actually increase.

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Speaker 4: I don't want to be hypercritical.

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Speaker 2: This would be good, but the.

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Speaker 4: Current government has criticized the previous government for not adequately

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Speaker 4: enforcing regulations on vaping, and they say that's why this

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Speaker 4: black market has emerged. And then yesterday this government has

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Speaker 4: announced further regulation on vaping. What is to say that

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Speaker 4: the same thing will not happen again.

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Speaker 2: That's a really good point and the Minister did acknowledge that,

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Speaker 2: and he said that their focus will be on stopping

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Speaker 2: the black market vapes at the borders.

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Speaker 3: And they don't come in and shipping containers labeled vapes.

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Speaker 3: This is hard work. We're expecting have our policing authorities

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Speaker 3: and border force people, but we're determined that something we

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Speaker 3: simply have to do.

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Speaker 2: As well as enforcing what's sold day to day.

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Speaker 3: With state and territory authorities going out and checking that

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Speaker 3: these convenience stores aren't breaking the law, because that is

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Speaker 3: what they will be doing. So we're under no illusion

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Speaker 3: about how hard this is.

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Speaker 2: So from here the Minister said they'll sit down with

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Speaker 2: state and territory governments to get the resourcing for this right.

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Speaker 2: And to your point, Zara, the money that the government

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Speaker 2: committed to in yesterday's announcement doesn't mention an enforcement strategy,

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Speaker 2: and it all does seem to be allocated to health

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Speaker 2: and public awareness campaigns, So we're going to have to

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Speaker 2: wait and see to know how effective it's going to be.

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Speaker 4: All of the data suggests that young people are disproportionately

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Speaker 4: taking up vaping. Our audience is disproportionately young, and so

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Speaker 4: we put it to our audience yesterday to ask them

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Speaker 4: what the announcement meant to them, whether it would encourage, discourage,

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Speaker 4: and so on. What were the findings.

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Speaker 2: So at the time of recording, about seventy seven percent

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Speaker 2: of people in our audience said they have or had vaped,

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Speaker 2: and of those who do vape, seventy six percent said

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Speaker 2: that they wish they vaped less. Now interestingly, about seventy

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Speaker 2: five percent of people in the TDA audience said that

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Speaker 2: they support the government making it harder to vape, and

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Speaker 2: forty five percent of those who do vape so that

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Speaker 2: they did so as an alternative to smoking.

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Speaker 4: I mean that points to something interesting, which is this

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Speaker 4: relationship between vaping and smoking. A big question for me

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Speaker 4: is if you're making vapes harder to access, do you

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Speaker 4: think that then more young people will take up cigarettes

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Speaker 4: and that we'll see this smoking.

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Speaker 2: Rate rise again? And that was coming through in the

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Speaker 2: comments on pieces we're putting up yesterday as well. I

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Speaker 2: think it's a real concern and it is one that

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Speaker 2: the minister addressed yesterday. As I've said already, the government

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Speaker 2: said it's going to work to make it easier to

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Speaker 2: get a prescription vape for those who want to use

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Speaker 2: it to help manage their nicotine addiction. But there was

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Speaker 2: another big announcement yesterday today.

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Speaker 3: I announced that tax on tobacco will be increased by

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Speaker 3: five percent per year over the next three years, starting

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Speaker 3: on September first.

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Speaker 2: The government's also going to change the rules so that

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Speaker 2: cigarettes and roll your own tobacco are taxed equally. Now.

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Speaker 2: Butler said this would make cigarettes less attractive and raise

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Speaker 2: an additional three point three billion dollars over the next

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Speaker 2: four years, and some of that money is going to

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Speaker 2: be reinvested into their health system.

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Speaker 4: Now the circle of life.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. It's interesting to note though that the government doesn't

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Speaker 2: seem to have any bold intentions here of further crackdowns

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Speaker 2: on cigarettes like those that we saw in New Zealand,

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Speaker 2: where the sale of cigarettes is banned for anyone born

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Speaker 2: after two thousand and eight. But you can't say that

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Speaker 2: about vaping. For vaping, there is a real sense of urgency.

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Speaker 3: You know, we have a closing window here before vapes

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Speaker 3: become so widespread, so accepted, so normalized as frankly some

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Speaker 3: would want them to be the National Party for example,

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Speaker 3: that it would be very, very difficult to take in

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Speaker 3: the action.

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Speaker 4: But I think it is also interesting to consider the

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Speaker 4: different perspectives on this, because when we're talking about taxing

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Speaker 4: a product, cigarettes are legal, vapes are not. The government

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Speaker 4: collects a lot of revenue and seemingly more over the

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Speaker 4: next couple of years. The Nationals have previously advocated for

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Speaker 4: making them legal vapes and then taxing them to generate

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Speaker 4: more government revenue. It does seem though, that this government,

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Speaker 4: the Albanese government, is not considering that it does not

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Speaker 4: seem to be on the table and is instead just

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Speaker 4: something that the Nationals have floated.

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Speaker 2: And so the big question now is about the effectiveness

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Speaker 2: of the government's announcements and whether it's going to be

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Speaker 2: enforced and how quickly are we going to see results.

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Speaker 2: There's no set date for the enforcement of these structures,

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Speaker 2: and we'll have to wait and see what happens.

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Speaker 4: Thanks for joining us on the Daily Odds. If you

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Speaker 4: learned something from today's episode, don't forget to hit subscribe,

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Speaker 4: so there's a TVA episode waiting for you every weekday morning.

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Speaker 4: We'll be back again tomorrow morning, but until then, have

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Speaker 4: a brilliant day,