A petition was launched by frustrated competitor David Towe in the wake of the furore<\/a>, which has amassed more than 8000 signatures.<\/p>\nLast week\u2019s meeting concluded that a collaboration between Motorsport Australia and the four aforementioned associations was needed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe all have members that are impacted by what we suspect is probably an unintended consequence of the health department updating its legislation around tobacco and health,\u201d Heritage Touring Cars president Chris Stillwell told Speedcafe.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt obviously has an impact on our members that own genuine cars that are presented at meetings with their historic livery.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think the consensus is that this is everybody\u2019s issue to try and get a resolution. We\u2019re probably all best served if we just work collaboratively together with Motorsport Australia to get an outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n
Stillwell said that he will discuss the next course of action with Motorsport Australia CEO John Blanksby and Motorsport Australia Historic Motorsport Committee chair Norman Gowers.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe previous exemption was a department memo and we think probably the easiest way forward is to see if there is enough enthusiasm between our elected officials and somebody in the Canberra bureaucracy to issue a revised departmental memo from the appropriate department to define what the intention of the legislation was in their view that gives an exemption for historic motorsport as we had previously,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo they see it that way? I couldn\u2019t tell you, but hopefully they will.\u201d<\/p>\n
Through the Parliamentary Friendship Groups, it\u2019s hoped that the Parliamentary Friends of Motorsport will provide an avenue for the affected parties to receive clarity from the government.<\/p>\n
The Parliamentary Friends of Motorsport is co-chaired by Tania Lawrence, federal member for Hasluck, who was elected the first female president of Motorcycling Australia.<\/p>\n
Garth Hamilton, elected to the house of representatives for Groom, is the other co-chair.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s hoped the federal government can issue a memo as it did for the former Public Health (Tobacco And Other Products) Act of 1992 that grants an exemption to tobacco-branded cars.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom our point of view, we\u2019re not looking to see a return of tobacco sponsorship or promotion. We\u2019re not funded by tobacco companies.\u2029We don\u2019t have commercial benefit in what we do,\u201d said Stillwell.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of our associations, our charters are about preserving and presenting historically significant cars from our history of motorsport. That\u2019s what we\u2019re about.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe exemptions that we\u2019re looking for are pretty narrow. Hopefully somebody in the federal parliament and the appropriate federal department agrees with that view.\u201d<\/p>\n
Whether a solution can be reached and when is the question on everyone\u2019s mind. Stillwell admitted that it will not be a quick fix given most involved were volunteers.<\/p>\n
In the meantime, competitors will have to tweak their liveries to remove tobacco branding if they wish to race.<\/p>\n
Four competitors in the upcoming Baskerville Historics will have to remove branding from their cars.<\/p>\n
Ironically, the Baskerville Historics meeting has been promoted with a John Player Special-inspired logo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Winfield Racing Nissan Skyline R32 at the 2024 Bathurst 1000 as part of the Heritage Touring Cars.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":916686,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-916685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=916685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/916686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=916685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=916685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=916685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"No](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Supercars-Bathurst1000-HerritageTouringCars-005-copy.jpg\")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tA Winfield Racing Nissan Skyline R32 at the 2024 Bathurst 1000 as part of the Heritage Touring Cars. Image: InSyde Media<\/p>\n