NSW Premier Chris Minns flags using cops to tackle illegal tobacco, vapes
Police could be called in to take over from NSW Health staff and tackle the booming tobacco black market, as Premier Minns calls on the Federal government to reduce tobacco taxes.
NSW
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Chris Minns has flagged major changes to the policing of illegal tobacco in NSW, while calling for the federal government to examine the increasing excise on cigarettes.
The Premier said he believed the enormity of the tobacco tax was driving the black market, causing tobacconists to spring up “on nearly every street corner”.
He said the government will look at removing responsibilities from NSW Health, which currently only employs less than 28 compliance inspectors to police illegal tobacco retailers. Instead, Mr Minns will consider funding NSW Police to enforce tobacco laws and crack down on illegal vendors.
“As we’re formulating the budget the NSW government and the police are going to have to make a decision about rolling out resources to confront what is absolutely illegal behaviour,” Mr Minns said on Monday.
“That would mean allocating police officers that are currently working on domestic violence cases and youth crime cases and major organised crime networks in NSW – take them off those important inquiries and send them into tobacco regulation. We may need to do that because I am concerned as a constituent and a father about the number of high street premises that have been taken over by tobacco firms. At the moment, Health are responsible for investigating across NSW illegal tobacco sales but they’re a health department and we want the health department running hospitals not conducting criminal investigations” Mr Minns claimed.
The Premier also said he believed the Albanese government should review the tobacco excise, with a view to reducing it.
“I’m not arguing about the public health benefits of putting an excise on tobacco – I think it has driven down the amount of people who use cigarettes in the community,” he said.
“But the massive increase has exploded the illicit tobacco marketplace and has meant that many people that wouldn’t go near any illegal behaviour ordinarily are buying illicit tobacco daily, on nearly every street corner.
“We need to have a look at how big this excise is, how it’s driving illegal tobacco sales in our community and is it the best use of NSW police time to be devoted to tobacco sales when in the end the Federal government is not getting the excise, not getting the tax that they thought would get” Mr Minns claimed.
But opposition police spokesman Paul Toole has lashed out at suggestions police should take responsibility for cracking down on illegal tobacco retailers, warning it could remove resources from communities struggling with police shortages. Mr Toole instead suggested the government invest more in health inspectors, saying police were too short staffed to deal with new enforcement responsibilities.
“It shouldn’t be the cops picking up the slack because of the failure of the Health department to deal with illegal tobacco here in the state,” he said.
“When police numbers are currently at an all time low, Chris Minns thinks he is going to give them more jobs to do.
“What Chris Minns is proposing is to take more cops off domestic violence and youth crime cases to deal with their failures to deal with illegal tobacco.
“Unless the Government is prepared to give more funding and more resources to hiring a lot more cops, communities are going to suffer from this knee-jerk reaction.”
The Australian Association of Convenience Stores (ACCS), the peak body representing convenience stores across the country, has called on Federal Health Minister Mark Butler to listen to the Premier’s calls to re-examine the exercise.
ACCS chief executive Theo Foukkare said while he agreed that NSW Health was the “wrong agency” to look after enforcement, he did not believe the responsibility should be put in the hands of police.
“The police are under-resourced and they have significant issues that they’re dealing with, whether it be domestic violence or other dangerous crimes in the community,” he said.
“We agree with the Premier that enforcement should come away from Health …
Health inspectors don’t have the wide-ranging police powers.”
Mr Foukkare said he believes NSW should adopt the South Australian model, where illegal tobacco enforcement is the responsibility of the state’s fair trading arm, Consumer and Business Services, whose consumer inspectors have greater powers to conduct inspections and issue closure orders.
The premier’s comments come after The Daily Telegraph revealed one full-time bureaucrat is responsible for monitoring and countering the sale of illicit tobacco and vapes in a section of regional NSW which is larger than Denmark.
The Daily Telegraph understands the Minns Government has assigned one authorised compliance officer to the Southern NSW Local Health District, a 44,000-square kilometre area that includes Crookwell, Goulburn, Yass, Batemans Bay, Cooma and Bega.
It would take about four hours to drive across the area by car.
Locals claim the lack of regular enforcement checks has allowed a black market to flourish in broad daylight.
Cobargo Hotel publican David Allen said the town of Bega, with just 6000 people, had several businesses which were known to sell illegal vapes and discounted cigarettes.
“The black market has driven out people doing the right thing,” he told this masthead.
“They can’t compete. When cost of living hits and the tobacco excise increases people will look for the cheaper options.
“It’s impacted our business as well. We are losing between $40,000 and $50,000 a year in profit on legal cigarettes, and that means we are not paying the government roughly $350,000 annually in excise. And that’s just one small country bottle shop.”
Mr Allen said he had also journeyed to another tobacconist about 80km away and was “staggered to see six shopping bags worth of illegal cigarettes and vapes sitting next to the shop register in plain sight”.
The tobacconist was next door to a police station. However, Mr Allen said he was surprised to learn after making a complaint that police were not the first point of contact for illicit tobacco, which was overseen by the health department.
According to NSW Health, the maximum penalty for illegally supplying vaping goods is seven years in jail, a fine of $1.54 million, or both.
In a statement, a NSW Health spokesman said it was in the process of “doubling the number of authorised inspectors” for illegal cigarettes and vapes across the state “from 14 to 28”.
NSW Health further added it had “conducted 102 retail inspections in Southern NSW Local Health District, seizing a total street value of $1.13 million for illicit tobacco” between April 2024 and March this year.
Upper House MP and former police officer Rod Roberts told this masthead the illegal tobacco trade was “not a job for NSW Health”.
“We are dealing with potential links to criminal organisations,” Mr Roberts said.
“This is a job for law enforcement.
“Clearly the Health Minister Ryan Park has his head in the sand.”
There are tobacco shops popping up on every street corner selling illegal tobacco and vapes.”
The number of businesses registered to sell tobacco in NSW has grown from 15,000 to almost 20,000 in the last five years.
There are several tobacconists in Goulburn and Batemans Bay.
Mr Park declined to comment on Sunday.
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