I can see seven smokes shops from my bus stop - governments must act

The issue of illicit tobacco is ramping up across Australia. We know that retailers, particularly tobacconists, are openly selling illicit cigarettes and are deliberately under-cutting public health efforts to help people quit smoking. Apart from their lower price, illicit cigarettes are no different from taxed cigarettes. Both products are deadly, addictive and cut a decade of life from people who smoke throughout their life.

Besides the health impacts, the cost of cigarettes is the most often cited reason for wanting to quit smoking. The lure of cheap cigarettes combined with retailers who are emboldened there will be no repercussions for selling is fuelling the illicit market. We’re not talking about a few rogue individuals selling cigarettes out of their cars in dark laneways – most Australians would never dream of buying smokes this way.

Authorities are grappling with the enforcement of tobacco regulations for an estimated 20,000 retailers in NSW.Credit: Sam Mooy

The lack of timely and transparent data on the size and scope of the illicit tobacco market, paired with slow and incomplete action to stamp it out, is threatening Australia’s tobacco control success. The tobacco industry has jumped at this golden opportunity, filled the evidence gap with its own biased reports and called for dramatic tobacco tax rollbacks.

Federal government data from October 2024 estimates that around 18 per cent of the total tobacco market is illicit, but it is fair to assume that the illicit market has since grown. Communities, especially parents, are tired of seeing yet another grubby tobacconist pop up in their neighbourhood shops.

Today, July 1, NSW has finally introduced a scheme that will require tobacco sellers to be licensed – from October this year. Adoption of a tobacco sales licensing scheme with a high fee and powerful enforcement options such as total loss of licence is long overdue.

The NSW scheme must be more than bureaucratic paperwork, powers to enable authorities to immediately shut down shops caught selling illicit tobacco are needed. The scheme should also be expanded to allow authorities to prosecute landlords who lease shops to illicit tobacco sellers. A licensing scheme could also be used to strictly limit the number of tobacco retailers. When less than 10 per cent of the Australian population regularly smokes, it is ridiculous that cigarettes are easier to buy than fresh fruit and vegetables.

The other day, I looked around while waiting for a bus in central Sydney and counted the number of places I could buy cigarettes. There were no less than seven shops selling smokes within spitting distance of my stop. Three of the shops even had large, lit-up signs advertising they were tobacconists. The windows of these same shops were filled with a wall of colourful sweets, candies, and snacks – like a beacon for children and hungry teenagers.

A tobacconist in my own suburb boldly sold a customer a handful of loose cigarettes pulled from a cheap pack while I was waiting in the queue. When selling dangerous, illicit goods is done so brazenly and openly, it requires equally bold action to protect public health.

Australia is a world leader in making smoking both undesirable and socially unacceptable. But while we’ve made cigarettes more expensive, put graphic warnings on packs, banned all tobacco advertising, and even rid our beaches of cigarettes, we’ve done very little to control how and where tobacco is sold.

Cigarettes are sold virtually everywhere, in all types of retailers.Credit: Sam Mooy

Cigarettes are sold virtually everywhere, in all types of retailers. Criminals have exploited this gap and threaten community safety and security. When tobacco is sold in so many shops with so few guard-rails, enforcement becomes far too challenging. Authorities could ease their own enforcement load by dramatically reducing the number of tobacco outlets.

It’s stating the obvious that selling cigarettes everywhere like they’re just another everyday, consumable good makes no sense. Up to two out three smokers will die because of their addiction if they are unable to quit. This devastating public health toll seems to have been lost in the finger-pointing about who is to blame for the rise in illicit tobacco.

Simplistic calls to “get rid of the tobacco tax” will serve only to further undermine public health. A whole-of-government approach that includes health authorities, law enforcement and regulators at national, state and local level is not as “sexy” as tax rollback. We need to urgently change how tobacco is sold to help smokers to quit and prevent young people from taking it up. It should not be so easy and commonplace to sell such an addictive and deadly product.

Most cigarettes sold in Australia remain the products that have been taxed, and these products continue to be widely sold with weak restrictions on retailers. On the same day that NSW’s licensing reforms begin, the Australian government is also launching the National Lung Cancer Screening Program for people who have a smoking history. But unless we tackle the unchecked availability of tobacco products, we risk only detecting disease while failing to address the root cause.

Innovative action that ends this “business as usual” approach could kill an industry that kills its most loyal customers. One day, cigarettes will be oddities, sold in few places to few people. It’s just a question of how fast Australia wants that to happen.

Becky Freeman is a professor with the School of Public Health, University of Sydney