Senator BARNETT (6:42 PM) —I rise tonight to speak on the Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 2) 2003-2004, Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2003-2004 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2003-2004. I want to highlight the cost to the health budget of the impact of obesity on the health system and talk about obesity as an epidemic in Australia today. This is very serious indeed. All the trends are heading in the wrong direction for this country. We cannot just put our heads in the sand and pretend that this will go away. In fact there is an imperative now more than ever for us to address this problem and to address it with all our might. This is something that is the responsibility of each of us as individuals to address. Parents must also take on this issue to look after the interests of their children. It is also an issue for all levels of government—the first, second and third tiers of government—and for all the key stakeholders.

I want to speak tonight about the importance of the role of those key stakeholders and urge them to be part of the solution and not just part of the problem. It is interesting that I speak about this tonight because yesterday in this parliament federal politicians and the community in general were given a wake-up call on childhood obesity. McDonald's Australia joined with health experts to put this issue on the national agenda at a forum on obesity and fast food reform, which I hosted, in the Australian parliament. We had McDonald's Australia chief executive Guy Russo, marathon Olympian and Commonwealth Games and world record holder Robert de Castella and Dr Jonathan Shaw of the International Diabetes Institute give presentations. They are all experts in their field and they gave excellent presentations.

The message is that obesity is an epidemic. Childhood obesity has more than doubled in the past 10 years and about half of our obese children, sadly, will carry that extra weight through to adulthood. As parents we all have a duty of care. If we do not get to our obese children now, they will be prone to heart attacks, cancer and diabetes and all the consequences that flow from that and other serious illnesses in later life. Yesterday we heard that depression is one of the serious consequences that flow from obesity. But if we do reach our children then they have an opportunity of living a wonderful and more healthy life—a long and vibrant life into the future. The results of yesterday's forum will be compiled and forwarded to the key decision makers in the government, specifically the Prime Minister, the Minister for Health and Ageing, the Minister for Education, Science and Training, the Minister for the Arts and Sport and the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Larry Anthony. No doubt they will be very interested in the outcome of those presentations that have been made.

It was interesting because yesterday a number of announcements were made, specifically by McDonald's. Before I mention those, I want to say that in the winter of 2002 I had the privilege of attending a health forum in the United States where the key topic was obesity and the obesity epidemic. I learnt a number of things, including the fact that 50 per cent of all deaths in that country can be postponed or prevented. That is not dissimilar to the situation in Australia. So what are we doing about it? On my return from that conference, on 20 June 2002 I made a call for the need for reform of the fast food industry, specifically the labelling of the nutritional value of these products. Interestingly, the response from the fast food industry at the time was that it was too hard and it could not be done. I have my statement of 20 June 2002 here where I said that `today's fast food companies in Australia could become the tobacco industry defendants of tomorrow'. In that statement I said that health warnings on fast food packaging:

So that call for nutritional information on fast food packaging was made. Then yesterday, nearly two years later, McDonald's announced that they would put that nutritional information on the packaging of their fast food products. I congratulate them for that. I am proud to say that they made those announcements and their plan is to go ahead on their packaging this month. Indeed, they announced a number of other reforms. A media release was put out yesterday from Guy Russo in which he announced that the most significant initiative would be the introduction of industry-first nutritional labelling on regular menu items. He made the comment that this was not only an Australian first but a world first. In the media release Mr Russo said:

He also said:

There you go. He also announced that there would be a lower sugar content in the buns and a reduction in sugar and total kilojoules in some of their other products, including the muffins, and the introduction of canola cooking oil. Basically, this says that there is reform afoot in this country of fast food and in offering more healthy options. I congratulate and commend McDonald's for the work that they are doing.

I invited all the key stakeholders in the fast food industry to that forum yesterday. I am happy to put on the public record that they were either unwilling or unable to attend. I have had correspondence with them and they have offered one-on-one meetings, but the bottom line is whether they are willing to commit to reform and to offering more healthy options for the Australian customer. McDonald's is leading on this issue and it is now for their competitors to come up to the mark and put their views, policies and initiatives for offering more healthy options. As I said earlier, they have to be part of the solution, not just part of the problem.

We have learnt that Australians are getting fatter—67 per cent of Australian men and now 57 per cent of Australian women are obese or overweight—and that childhood obesity has more than doubled in the last 10 years. We have learned that there are 8,000 deaths in Australia each year which are related to weight problems and that obese people are six times more likely to get heart disease and 10 times more likely to get diabetes. We in Australia, sadly, have seriously unhealthy habits and we refuse to change. We need to not put our heads in the sand but do something about it. It is up to each one of us to be part of the solution. I hope that yesterday's forum will be part of that wake-up call on the obesity epidemic. We need pre-emptive action and we need it fast.

In the 21st century, children have been sucked into this vortex where they have this incredible peer group pressure. They have television, videos, video games and the Internet, so you cannot blame them for living a sedentary lifestyle. As leaders in the community, what are we doing to address this epidemic, this problem? One hundred years ago it was totally different: we were far more physically active and living was perhaps more tough and more challenging. Particularly in the Western world, in the industrialised nations and in countries such as the US, Australia and the UK the obesity epidemic is getting worse. We need to change our lifestyle and change the way we do things such as walking to school. As a kid I rode my bike to school. I also got on the bus. But I did a lot more walking then than the kids do now. How are we helping our children to change the way they live their lives? These are very important issues. There are a number of initiatives that are under way to address these problems. I congratulate and compliment the Australian government on the leadership they have taken with the National Obesity Task Force and on the work that that task force has been doing. It has made a number of recommendations.

I have hosted two forums on childhood obesity and healthy lifestyle to raise community awareness in Tasmania. Larry Anthony, the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, launched one of those forums. We have had great support from the Australian government for this. In fact, Guy Russo attended the one in Hobart on 8 May and Dr Paul Zimmet and a number of keynote guest speakers appeared in November 2002 in Launceston.

I am delighted to have been involved with the Australian Association of National Advertisers, which has done a lot of hard work behind the scenes. A lot of people do not know of the work that it has done in developing an advertising campaign which will be targeting young people. I commend and congratulate them on their work—in particular Ian Alwill, who heads the AANA, and all his colleagues in that group. It has been a pleasure working with them, and I look forward to the launch of that campaign in due course at an appropriate time. That campaign will help raise awareness of the importance of being active. There are two simple key messages, and they are to have a balanced diet and to have regular exercise. They are quite simple messages, but they are hard to implement. As I say, we have unhealthy habits and we need to change. Before we can fix a problem we must acknowledge the problem. That is the first step. We must acknowledge the problem of this obesity epidemic. We need to raise the concerns and the consequences of obesity so that we can then address those and tackle them head-on. Yes, fast food reform is necessary and needs to happen, but simply having that reform will not solve the problem in and of itself.

I have worked hand in glove with the AANA on the national education and advertising campaign and also have encouraged them to prepare and implement a code of practice for advertising to children. Part of the solution is in the marketing and advertising of the problem to children. That code has now been prepared. Perhaps it is not as tough as some people would like it to be, but it is a good first step. It has been accepted by the AANA and its members. I now hope that the other key stakeholders—the fast food industry, the food industry, the food and grocery manufacturers and suppliers—will sign up to this code, which will encourage appropriate and sensible advertising to children. They are some key initiatives.

What are some of the other key initiatives—and I guess these are personal views—which I think will help address the obesity epidemic, the health consequences and the terrible consequences that flow from it? Firstly, compulsory physical education in schools. Some states do have that, particularly in primary schools. I congratulate those states. Sadly, my home state of Tasmania does not. It has a belligerent attitude to this issue, and it is not adequately addressing the problem. Another area where we can act on this is in school canteens, again particularly in primary schools. There has been some good work, some progress, there in offering more healthy options for children, but a lot more can be done. As you, Mr Acting Deputy President, and other senators would know, this is primarily a responsibility for the state governments around this country and I urge them to be far more proactive in this area.

I have been advocating for a long time GP lifestyle prescriptions—that is, prescriptions by your doctor relating to how you live your life, changing your lifestyle through more regular exercise and a more balanced diet rather than just through a prescription of a drug or a pill that will address a particular health problem. If we can think more laterally and be more creative in the way we address this epidemic, then we have a chance to fix it and to turn around the trends that are all headed in the wrong direction at the moment.

Another area, which is just a one-off thing—communities, families and individuals can come on board with this—is TV-free and Internet-free weekends or days. Just pick a day and see how you go. And guess what happens: when you are not watching the box, the television, you are doing something else and the chances are that you will be exercising—walking, walking the dog or gardening—or doing something productive, something active. It is not so much what you are doing when you are watching television; it is more what you are not doing. That point was made very clearly yesterday in an excellent presentation by Dr Jonathan Shaw of the International Diabetes Institute.

My hope and dream is that within a few decades we will look back—hopefully, it will not take a few decades, but it will take a good amount of time—and say that fixing the obesity epidemic by living healthier lifestyles was as vital as changing attitudes and behaviour towards smoking. We know the impact and implications of smoking. The tragic news recently in Tasmania that our state Premier is suffering from cancer as a result of smoking is very sad indeed, but it has certainly stirred many towards living a healthier lifestyle by stopping smoking and avoiding the consequences.

I would like to commend the work of the Parliamentary Diabetes Support Group. Obesity does lead to diabetes; it is one of the key outcomes. The support group is chaired by Judy Moylan MHR, from Western Australia, who does an impeccable job for the group. It is a bipartisan group comprising Dick Adams MHR, me, Cameron Thompson from Queensland and Mal Washer. We work well together to help and support people with diabetes and to tackle the problems associated with it. We work with Diabetes Australia and with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. We have an excellent relationship with both those organisations, including Dr Peter Little and Brian Conway from Diabetes Australia and Sheila Royles from the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation as well as many others involved in those groups.

Before I close, I want to commend Greg Hunt for his initiative of walking 500 kilometres around his electorate of Flinders, just south of Melbourne, to address diabetes and to raise money for research for people with type 1 diabetes. Greg is going to be walking for a cure for a number of weeks—I think it is three weeks from the end of April to early May. What a great initiative. I commend him for that. There are a number of things we can do to tackle the obesity epidemic. A lot is being done, but there is a lot more to be done. I urge everyone to play our part in tackling this epidemic.