Stirling Griff (SA, Centre Alliance) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Aged Care and Senior Australians, Senator Colbeck, as chair of the Australia and New Zealand Ministerial Forum on Food Regulation. Minister, I refer you to your recent letter to me regarding the forum's decision to ask FSANZ to revise its proposal for mandatory pregnancy warning labels on packaged alcohol. In your letter you claim: 'The FSANZ proposal places an unreasonable cost burden on the alcohol industry.' FSANZ's cost-benefit analysis says each new case of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder costs at least $13,847 a year in health and disability costs alone, which equates to a projected annual cost of over $3 million each and every year for new cases, yet the one-off cost to industry is just $4,924 per product. Minister, are lives or alcohol industry profits more important to government?