Page 3734 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 24 August 2011
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complementary step that we should also be pursuing. We need to recognise the social determinants of health—we had this discussion just recently here in this place—and that people from poorer socioeconomic backgrounds are likely to suffer poorer health outcomes. Studies have shown that children from lower income households are more likely to suffer from obesity. Unfortunately, in some of those households, fast food is treated as a staple food rather than a treat. Some of that can also be put down to tight family budgets, and a lot of this fast food, unfortunately, is a lot cheaper than buying fresh food.
I understand that nutritional information being provided on fast food has been part of a discussion at COAG level and it is the subject of the Blewett review. This certainly will not be a quick process; COAG is notoriously slow. Some have said it is a bit like waiting for Godot. It is certainly not a reason for jurisdictions such as ours not to take steps forward. Where we can advance in areas, we should be taking that opportunity. The ACT has been seen as a leader on many issues, and this will not be the first time that we have stepped outside of a COAG process to be moving some things forward.
This bill is a very good idea, irrespective of how long it may take other jurisdictions to agree. What we need to do is look around the country and see what has happened. New South Wales have already got their legislation in place. South Australia are moving to do this through regulations. Victoria are talking about and considering moving on this issue. Another very important point to make is that this bill is consistent with the national principles that have been discussed at COAG. So it is consistent with the principles that have been talked about in that federal process.
All too often national processes do not serve the best interests of the people we represent, and, while we readily acknowledge that there is a place for consistency, administrative ease should not come at the expense of health outcomes for the community. But I also would say that I believe that, as I said, it is consistent with the national principles and it is consistent with the New South Wales legislation, apart from the service station issue. Therefore, this is not going off on a different direction; it is sticking very much with what is already on the table.
The question for us to answer is: is this a good idea and will it have a positive impact on the health of Canberrans? The undeniable answer is that we have the evidence and the experience from other jurisdictions across the world that, indeed, it has had a positive impact on people’s health and therefore should be supported. In the US, where reviews have been conducted on the implementation of similar fast food labelling schemes, some regions reported good outcomes. There are reports of restaurants running out of low kilojoule food in New York once the customers saw how energy-dense some of the more typical meals were.
We acknowledge that some reviews out of the US have shown that the fast food labelling scheme only affected a small percentage of customers. I suggest that there are a range of other factors that contribute to this. As I said earlier, socioeconomic factors appear to have had a significant influence on the outcome of these studies. That is unfortunately because much of this junk food is very, very cheap.
Alongside the introduction of this fast food labelling bill, we need to see greater education about energy content and the kilojoule measurement—what they are and
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