Arabic version: خبراء يدعون إلى تشديد الإنفاذ بدلاً من خفض ضريبة التبغ
According to The Guardian, health experts say Australia should strengthen enforcement and monitor tobacco imports before considering lower tobacco taxes, responding to a Coalition proposal to cut the excise by 80%.
Shadow health minister Anne Ruston said the proposed tax reduction, combined with an additional $200m for law enforcement, would help take market control from organised crime. She said the package would also include market regulation and efforts intended to make tobacco products harder for children to access, while anti-smoking and anti-vaping campaigns would put downward pressure on smoking rates.
Professor Becky Freeman, a University of Sydney tobacco control expert, said existing laws should be enforced to curb supply and target criminal networks. She warned that illicit tobacco markets are shaped by supply chains, enforcement capacity, organised crime opportunities, retail controls, border dynamics and political pressures. An 80% tax cut, she said, could also lower illicit prices if illegal supply networks remain intact.
Freeman said Australia could reduce its number of legal tobacco retailers, estimated at 40,000. Dr Cheneal Puljevic of the University of Queensland said governments should also reduce demand by highlighting the harms of smoking and supporting quitting. She called for excise revenue to fund free nicotine replacement therapy and said international track-and-trace systems could help authorities monitor shipments entering the country.
Independent economist Chris Richardson supported a temporary excise reduction alongside stronger enforcement, describing it as a possible circuit breaker. Illicit tobacco accounted for 80% of cigarettes smoked by Australians in 2025, while untaxed packets could cost as little as $10 compared with more than $40 for legal packets. The federal government collects nearly $30 per legal packet, about 75% of its price; excise revenue peaked at $16.3bn in 2019-20 and was expected to generate $5.5bn last financial year and $4.8bn this year.
