Harley Stanton: As I look back on the last forty years in tobacco control, in some ways it seems to me that 1990 was almost the hinge point. Mike (Daube), Maurice Swanson and their colleagues ran the 7th World Conference on Tobacco and Health in Perth, WA. It was an outstanding conference at which the first ‘insider’ information on what the tobacco industry was doing was released by Mike Pertschuk. [91]

Not everything up to that time was successful. For instance, David encouraged Judy Rassaby[92] and Isobel Larcombe[93] to establish a Quit line and I joined with them in that work at the Anti-Cancer Council at Jolimont.

Now at that time tobacco advertising was still around. The Quit line was unsuccessful. There simply wasn’t the community will to take up what was on offer. Now, of course, you wouldn’t be without it, but the timing was actually wrong for the circumstances that prevailed in the community.

Dorothy Reading: David ahead of his time again.

Lyn Roberts: I’d like to mention two things that have been brushed over and that have to do with resources and where they actually came from.

There were two investments that, I think, were very important. One was ACOSH in WA. And the other was ASH[94] funded by the Cancer Councils around the country and also the Heart Foundation, which, I suspect, as was often the case was a junior partner.

There was a commitment and there was money there and, in the case of ASH, there was an opportunity to have a bit more of a radical perspective and to be able to do some things that I understand the Heart Foundation was a bit nervous about but could come at with something at arm’s length.

I think that was really so very significant. It meant there were a number of people whose job it was to do something in the tobacco control space. It was a bit of a luxury to have one or two people at ACOSH such as Ruth Shean[95] and Mike.

Did you start ACOSH, Mike?

Mike Daube: No, no. ACOSH was started by Cotter Harvey actually, as Simon said. Then in the late 1970s and early ‘80s it was taken over by some radical young doctors . . . Bruce Armstrong, Kingsley Faulkner,[96] Bill Musk,[97] and a few others. It was housed in the Cancer Council thanks to Clive Deverall,[98] and the first director was Steve Woodward, then Ruth Shean, then Noni Walker.[99]

Ron Borland: Tobacco control needs money, but incredibly little money is spent in terms of the progress that’s been made.

I can recall in the mid-1990s, about the time Michelle started documenting the funding of tobacco control, attending a meeting at the (Victorian) Health Department. Someone from the alcohol and drug sector was complaining about how much money tobacco control had compared to what they (the alcohol and drug sector) had.

I was able to quote some of Michelle’s figures. They were aghast. They could not believe we had achieved what we had with what, in their terms, was peanuts.

Meredith Carter: Talking about factors that contributed to major change in tobacco control, I think the element of surprise was fairly crucial.

Comment was made earlier that the tobacco companies made some quite astonishing errors. I think one of them was not to engage with the health sector and particularly with the health ministry about what the plans might be to ameliorate the impact of their product, as the alcohol industry has.

It seems to me that when the tobacco legislation was passed they were taken completely by surprise. I was brought in to help Andrew (Herington) in a specially created little unit within the (Victorian) Health Department. Like others in the unit, I was specifically recruited, in my case from Slater and Gordon as a legal advisor.

Everybody in the Health Department seemed to know about the unit and it didn’t undertake its business particularly secretly. But when the tobacco legislation came into Parliament as I understand it, it was a complete surprise to the tobacco industry, and that was a major factor that assisted in getting it through.

Ann Westmore: Is that accurate?

Dorothy Reading: The tobacco industry had in fact always had routine quarterly meetings with the Health Minister. So Tom (Roper) would have experienced those, and then David White.

The industry also had meetings with MPs who were thought to be supportive. They met regularly with the MPs around Moorabbin where the Philip Morris factory was situated, for example.

Their intelligence systems were bad and that was partly because they were talking to the wrong people. But there was actually very considerable control over who had access to the information about what was going on.

Witness to the History of Australian Medicine