ACTING CHAIR —Thank you for your appearance by phone here today at our inquiry. We understand that information on parliamentary privilege has been provided to you already. We have your submission, No. 75, and we thank you for that. Would you like to make a short opening statement before we proceed to ask you questions about your submission?

Mr Mason —Thank you, Senators, for this opportunity. The idea at the heart of my submission is twofold. There is an inherent conflict in an industry which seeks to portray itself as reducing the consumption of alcohol while depending for its sales on the increased consumption of alcohol. It is not a criticism. It is an ineluctable conflict in which it finds itself caught. I say that as a wine drinker and a beer drinker, and I make no criticism of the industry other than to say that until that conflict is clearly recognised anything that the industry suggests is going to be skewed by that lack of recognition.

The second point I wanted to make in my submission was that advertising cannot really influence a cohort out of the advertisement. You can make something attractive to somebody but it is very hard to make something attractive to one group and, in doing so, make it unattractive to another group. As I have pointed out, any advertising, be it just display advertising associated with famous sports people or advertising showing that that you can be wise, witty and a member of Mensa if you drink fine wine, will inherently be attractive to young people because they want to be like adult people as well. So I do not really see that setting up a filter advertisement, a censor advertisement, if you like, is going to achieve the result that the bill might have been intended to achieve.

Those are my two main points. One is that the industry itself finds itself in a conflict, on the horns of a dilemma, and the other, at the heart of my submission, is that if the advertising of alcohol were phased out completely the way that advertising tobacco was that would have the most long-lasting and the most widespread impact on the consumption of alcohol. That is my opening statement and I am ready for questions.

Senator FIELDING —Mr Mason, thank you for your submission and your appearance by teleconference. Your job of course is to look after the interests of children and you have identified alcohol as a problem if children drink it and if others drink it and neglect or abuse their children. Can you tell us a bit about what sort of alcohol abuse you have come across in your role as commissioner?

Mr Mason —It is not so much my role as commissioner. For 30 years I have been a family lawyer engaged in child protection court work, and alcohol is the elephant in the room. You cannot move in child protection work without coming across a bottle of some kind. I think there is no-one in the country who would gainsay that.

Senator FIELDING —Thank you. You summarised a fair few of your points in one quick hit, I think. You make the obvious point that is often forgotten. To quote from your submission:

Mr Mason —Yes.

Senator FIELDING —To do that, all alcohol ads link the product to some sort of success. Alcohol advertising, you say, should therefore be banned. Can you explain how this might happen ‘in discussion with the industry’? That is on page 4.

Mr Mason —Yes. It would probably cause significant disruption to the alcohol and advertising industries if advertising were phased out. I think that, if you remember—it would have been the seventies or the eighties—when they phased out tobacco advertising, they gave several years notice to the industry that it was going to happen. One of the last things that went, I remember, was the Benson & Hedges World Cup. That was, I think, the last gasp—if I can use that frightful pun—of the tobacco advertising industry. As I say, this is a very good example of one of the conflicts that the alcohol industry finds itself in. If they say, ‘Whatever you do, don’t ban alcohol advertising,’ I am reminded of Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox in the southern states story. Remember where Brer Rabbit says, ‘Please don’t throw me into the briar patch; whatever you do—you can eat me; you can cook me—don’t throw me into the briar patch.’

I am suspicious of statements from the industry when they say reducing advertising will not affect consumption. If that is the case, then good; let us just stop it instantly. If they say, however, ‘Advertising is necessary for brand identification only,’ that has been demonstrated not to be the case with tobacco. People still buy tobacco; people still prefer one brand of tobacco to another, even though there is no advertising. They do so on the basis of taste rather than on that of which famous person the brand is associated with or the colour or theme of the advertisement. What I am saying is that if the industry supports advertising then there is something wrong with it and that if they do not support it then it may as well go.

Senator COLBECK —Completely off subject for a moment, as a senator for Tasmania can I ask you where you are and whether you are using a Next G telephone?

Mr Mason —No, I am in Bagdad and I am using a 3G telephone. I should be in range, but I am struggling.

Senator COLBECK —I will talk to Senator Conroy about that next week for you!

Mr Mason —Thank you very much.

Senator COLBECK —Effectively, what you are saying is that it is not possible to advertise alcohol and not influence young people—essentially because they aspire to be like adults.

Mr Mason —That is my case, yes.

Senator COLBECK —So the industry code that specifically targets adults, by doing so, effectively influences people under the age for drinking.

Mr Mason —Yes. If you think about it for a moment, the sports stars who are associated with any form of sponsorship are, by and large, adults. Young people, as is commonly known, see sports people as role models and aspire to be like them. Inherent in that is aspiring to be an adult like them—not just a good netball player or footy player but a good adult, if you like. That is why the association of the adult sports person with the product influences the child around the product. The child wants to be like Shane Warne, so they will go with Vodafone or whatever it is that Shane Warne is wearing on his shirt.

Senator COLBECK —Would that translate to other forms of entertainment—for example, where you have people who are in the entertainment or the arts industry involved in that sort of promotion? Would it have a similar effect?

Mr Mason —In terms of aspiring to be like Russell Crowe or whatever, if Russell is advertising sports shoes or is advertising a motor vehicle brand, yes, the same thing applies. A 14-year-old boy will want to drive a BMW if Russell Crowe is driving a BMW—or a Prius, if you like. I do not see any distinction between the nature of the products or the nature of the industries that the sponsorship figures are working in.

Senator COLBECK —Is there any specific research that you can point us to that would demonstrate that effect?

Mr Mason —I am sitting in the car in Bagdad!

Senator COLBECK —I am happy for you to take that on notice, bearing in mind that you are in Bagdad! If you could provide something to that effect to us on notice, that would be extremely helpful.

Mr Mason —I think I can spend some time on that this week and dig it up. I am in Mangalore now, so it is getting better! That is, I will dig up the research on the effectiveness of advertising.

Senator COLBECK —I would suggest there are some people in the advertising industry that might have some argument with you, but it is a very interesting concept.

Mr Mason —If people in the advertising industry cavil at the argument, you would have to wonder then why it is such a common form of advertising to connect a product with a famous name—to get Shane Warne or Russell Crowe. That is my point: if an alcohol brand is associated with a team, a sport or an individual, young people who love that sport and love that team or love that individual will be drawn to the product. That is the whole rationale, surely, behind associating the product with the famous name.

Senator COLBECK —Thanks very much.

ACTING CHAIR —I have just one more question, Mr Mason. You make quite a compelling case for the effect of advertising on people’s consumption levels, but let us take that further. We all know that obesity is a major problem in Australian society at the moment, particularly among children. Why don’t we ban all advertising of high-fat foods?

Mr Mason —Or all advertising of all foods, perhaps?

ACTING CHAIR —Arguably.

Mr Mason —I take that point. That is true, but you cannot undo the negative effects of tobacco and alcohol by increased exercise. When we are talking about children and the drugs alcohol and tobacco, one of the strongest arguments against advertising and for advertising bans is the question of uptake. If people take up smoking or drinking when they have already become adults, there is research that shows that they consume less than people who take it up when they are kids. It is about getting them when they are young, and that is my major concern with binge drinking and with other harmful things like tobacco. When you are talking about fatty foods, as I say, there is nothing inherently dangerous in fatty foods. There is something inherently dangerous in drinking ethanol.

ACTING CHAIR —Okay.

Mr Mason —That is the distinction there.

ACTING CHAIR —Thank you for that. We are pressed for time, so we are going to have to leave it there. I thank you for persevering to give your evidence from the wilds of Tasmania, and thank you very much for taking that request for further evidence on notice to provide to the committee. We have to report fairly soon, so if you can get that to us as soon as possible that would be great.

Mr Mason —Thank you very much.

ACTING CHAIR —That concludes our evidence for today.