Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I am speaking on the Competition and Consumer Amendment (Country of Origin) Bill 2016 in support of the amendment moved by the member for Perth. Australian people deserve to know where their food comes from. They deserve clear and concise food labels to ensure that they can make informed decisions regarding the food that they and their families are consuming. The purpose of this bill is to amend the Australian Consumer Law to simplify the test that is used to justify a claim that certain foods were made in Australia in a specified manner. The bill achieves this by amending one of the safe harbour provisions in the Australian Consumer Law.

The Trade Practices Act was the first Commonwealth statute to contain consumer protection provisions. In its earliest form, the consumer protection provisions contained in the TPA were: a general prohibition against misleading or deceptive conduct in trade and commerce, a broad prohibition against making a false representation about the country of origin of goods, and a prohibition against engaging in conduct which was liable to mislead the public as to the nature, including any country of origin, the manufacturing process, the characteristics, the suitability for their purpose or the quantity of any goods. Australia's country-of-origin laws have continued to develop in line with domestic judicial determinations and consistent with Australia's emerging international obligations as a member of the World Trade Organization. The Trade Practices Amendment (Country of Origin Representations) Act 1998 inserted what were colloquially known as 'safe harbour' provisions into the trade practices laws, establishing the regime for determining when goods would and would not be regarded as made in, produced in or substantially grown in Australia.

The TPA was renamed the Competition and Consumer Act with effect from 1 January 2011, codifying the safe harbour provisions as defences. Under the current law as it sits before the introduction of this bill, if businesses are to rely on the general country-of-origin safe harbour defence, they must satisfy two separate criteria: the goods must be substantially transformed in the country of origin being claim—this is known as the substantial transformation test—and 50 per cent or more of the total costs to produce or manufacture the goods must have occurred in that country. This is known as the cost of production/manufacture test. If a business makes a country-of-origin claim for a product and it is alleged to be misleading, deceptive or false, that business has an automatic defence to the allegation if it can show that the product meets the safe harbour defence for that claim. This amendment bill simplifies the tests used to justify a country of origin 'Made in' claim by clarifying what substantial transformation means and altering the definition of substantial transformation as it applies to safe harbour provisions under Australian Consumer Law.

This legislation also removes the current 50 per cent production cost test, which becomes redundant for food products with the introduction of labels showing the percentage of Australian ingredients. That is the great benefit of what is proposed in this bill. Australians will now be able to get a clear indicator on labels on the backs of products of the percentage of Australian based ingredients that make up that product. This will end some of the confusion that has historically existed with this issue not only in our domestic produce market but also internationally with our exports. It is important that a delicate balance is achieved that provides Australians with a thorough and accurate understanding of where their food comes from, while not overburdening Australia's food processors, which could lead to their relocation offshore.

In February 2015, the Labor Party committed to finding a bipartisan solution to food labelling. We saw what an important issue it was for the Australian public, and we committed to working with the government on achieving a sustainable and indicative program that provided reliable data and information for Australia's consumers. It also highlighted the importance of bringing relevant ministers and industry leaders together to develop a consistent approach to the food industry. This bill sets out that new regime. The elements of it are that goods can be represented as being grown in Australia, if each significant ingredient or component has been grown in Australia and all processes involved in the production or manufacture of the goods happened right here on domestic soil. This is much the same as the previous regime but, in terms of the legislation, there is a much greater clarification.

The rules around goods having a 'Produce of Australia' label are not changing. Importantly, the ingredients of goods with a 'Made in' or `Manufactured in' or 'Originating from' Australia label are changing, and they are as follows: the goods must have been substantially transformed in Australia, and no representation must be made that the goods were grown or produced in that country.

Further, the bill also governs the use of country-of-origin marks, such as the 'Made in Australia' gold kangaroo in the green triangle, which has been the symbol of Australian produce and Australian-produced products for many decades now. It is something that is well-known to the Australian public—although I did meet a Chinese businessperson who recently expressed to me his view that the label was confusing on food products for many people in China, who, when they saw it, believed that the package contained kangaroo, because of the gold kangaroo in the triangle. Maybe that is something for future governments to consider in respect of the Chinese market and the growing middle class in China and their food-consuming habits.

Nonetheless, this bill also defines the area of goods being substantially transformed, makes it clear that packaging materials are not treated as ingredients or components for goods with 'Product of' or 'Grown in' labels and mandates that water used to reconstitute dehydrated or concentrated ingredients is deemed to have the country of origin of the dehydrated ingredient, irrespective of the actual origin of the water.

While these indicators and this new regime are not perfect—they do not indicate country of origin for imported ingredients, for instance—the new country-of-origin labelling ingredients have been described by CHOICE as:

… a big step towards ending the confusion around country of origin labelling, especially for consumers who want to know how much of a product was manufactured or grown locally.

The Australian Food and Grocery Council have also been supportive of these reforms, stating that it is:

… a recognition of the importance of Australian jobs in the food production and processing sector

In government, Labor worked to ensure Australians conducted a comprehensive review of labelling laws and worked closely with the states, through COAG, to improve guidance for both consumers and industry. As I mentioned earlier, Labor has demonstrated a constructive approach to working with the government on this issue—a very important issue for Australian consumers. I am pleased to say that we now have a much clearer regime with better information for Australian consumers about the origins of the food they consume, and that is a positive step for our nation. I am happy to commend this bill to the House with the amendment moved by the member for Perth.

See this speech in context