David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I seek leave to table it.

The TEMPORARY CHAIR: Is leave granted? Leave is not granted.

I'm happy to email it through if that's of interest. It makes good practical sense because Canberra is where our Public Service is headquartered. In the event of an emergency, we want and need the ACDC to be positioned close to parliament, close to government, close to the Department of Health and close to our national security agencies. We saw just how critical coordination is through the pandemic. I really thank and welcome the government's commitment to Canberra.

The ACDC could also help Canberra recruit more desperately needed clinicians. Part of what makes Canberra an attractive destination for clinicians is that we can often offer those clinicians some diversity in their work. In Canberra we have clinicians working in our hospitals, in our general practice and in our pharmacies while they're also working in the Department of Health or the Therapeutic Goods Administration. Canberra offers opportunities for clinicians to practice in public health and in public policy whilst also seeing patients on the front line of our public services. For a jurisdiction with a very low proportion of GPs, as we have canvassed in this chamber, and a jurisdiction that lacks a number of specialties, the ACDC offers us an opportunity to draw a few more doctors, nurses and pharmacists to our growing city. That's why I fought as hard as I could to make sure that it was based in Canberra, here in the ACT.

I want to thank the AMA ACT, the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation ACT branch and the Pharmacy Guild ACT branch for backing that call and for recognising the difference a new public health agency could make to our local workforce. What we've heard around the traps is that it wasn't a sure thing. Melbourne put up some stiff competition for the ACDC, but, on this occasion, I think Canberra made a better case and the reasons were very clear for that decision. I again commend the government for bringing forward this legislation.

I think the COVID pandemic was clearly a wake-up call for the nation and reminded us that we aren't immune to pandemics. It is likely that we will have to confront more of these situations going forward, with scientists warning that climate change is expected to accelerate the emergence and reemergence of infectious diseases. The government's own national climate risk assessment shows that climate change will increase risks to our health more broadly, including by exacerbating noncommunicable diseases. In fact, we are already seeing that. During the Black Summer bushfires, we saw 445 excess deaths attributable to smoke exposure. Currently, 3,200 Australians die each year from respiratory disease related to air pollution. That is more people than die on our roads each year. Even more frightening, we know now that hotter days are linked with more suicides, higher rates of family and domestic violence and more mental health emergencies. According to child and adolescent psychiatrist Dr Cybele Dey, even mild heat has been shown to increase suicidal distress amongst young people. We've already locked in warming, and now we are going to need the dedicated expertise from the ACDC to provide advice on how to manage this from a public health perspective. So I'm very pleased to see that the ACDC will take a role in advising governments on the public health risk of climate change. This is essential work. This is critical work, and we need to ensure that they are well resourced to do this.

Like some of my colleagues here in the chamber, I also believe that the ACDC should consider all preventable health conditions. The greatest burden of disease in Australia is not from communicable diseases; it's in non-communicable diseases. If we hope for a healthier future, we want and we need the ACDC to be providing advice on how we can manage all types of disease from a public health perspective, because we know that, as a country, we're not doing enough when it comes to prevention. We have a ballooning health budget and all sorts of issues. We're very good at treating, but we need to be far better at prevention and actually setting Australians up to live a healthy, longer life—a real focus on health span.

One of the other things that I wanted to touch on quickly—I understand others are wanting to speak—is that we should include gambling. We have seen it reported in the news this week there has been a steady increase in problem gambling over the past year, which has coincided with the increase—