Michelle Ananda-Rajah (Higgins, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

As I've said in this chamber before, I saw the physical effects of nicotine addiction up close and personal when I practised in a hospital. It results in accelerated atherosclerosis, which pretty much affects every single blood vessel in the body. Large organs are affected as well as small organs and everything in between. It results in stroke, heart attack and peripheral vascular disease, which then leads to serial amputation. The health effects of nicotine addiction are well recognised but probably less so are the societal hazards, although they are now becoming more evident in our streets and suburbs, particularly in Victoria.

The damaging effect of illicit tobacco in Australia is complex and requires a coordinated response across multiple jurisdictions, state and federal, as well as multiple departments. The illicit tobacco trade includes the unlicensed production or importation of tobacco plant or leaf and manufacturing of tobacco products. These activities are conducted by highly adaptive criminal organisations and can involve violence, including arson and assault, and result in evasion of tax and duties needed for the provision of other government services, such as. For example, health care or education. This unlicensed access to tobacco products by Australians of all ages results in worsening nicotine addiction.

It was the Labor government under Gillard and health minister Nicola Roxon that introduced plain packaging. It was a world first. Labor governments have a proud legacy of tobacco control. That one single intervention drove smoking rates down and it has been picked up by multiple other countries around the world. Now we are in a fight for our lives with respect to illicit tobacco. As a government, we are tackling the issue head on by working across justice, law enforcement and health portfolios, as well as state and territory governments. The Australian Border Force has seized illicit tobacco being imported into Australia that has equated to over 1.7 billion illicit cigarettes and over 867 tonnes of looseleaf tobacco—it's mind-boggling—in the last financial year alone and local raids of illegal suppliers has produced quick wins. The Illicit Tobacco Taskforce across the Australian Border Force, ATO, the Department of Home Affairs, the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission, as well as the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, are targeting these criminal syndicates that are having the greatest impact in Australia and tackling activities at all points of the supply chain—offshore importation and production and domestic manufacture and sale.

We hear criticism that we are not doing enough when in fact we are doing a lot and it is being coordinated across multiple facets, multiple jurisdictions and multiple departments, such is the complexity. The syndicates are highly adaptive. There's so much money flowing through these syndicates. But we owe it to the Australian people to try to smash them.

Penalties are significant. For example, the maximum penalty for illicit tobacco offences under the Customs Act is 10 years imprisonment. It comes with a monetary penalty of five times the duties evaded or both. In January of this year the Albanese government announced a major Border Force crackdown on the importation of illegal tobacco and $188.5 million has been committed over the next four years to the Australian Border Force to deliver a new compliance model, in partnership with states and territories.

The Australian Border Force will lead Commonwealth state and territory partners in a coordinated effort to tackle all aspects of illicit tobacco. The model has three prongs. The first is to stem the flow of illicit tobacco into Australia. This means that the ABF, with international partners, will work to target and disrupt illicit tobacco in source and transit countries before it even reaches our borders. We will boost ADF capacity to combat illicit tobacco trade at the border, and we will bring together stakeholders to deliver a coordinated, multi-agency and multijurisdictional response across states and territories.

As I said, this is only one facet of the broad agenda that we have with respect to tobacco control. We are also targeting vapes, as this is a scourge for our youth that is essentially a gateway drug into nicotine addiction. In the middle of this year we'll be introducing legislation to finally see these vapes off our streets and out of our suburbs. We would like to ensure that our schoolchildren can go to school without being targeted by vape stores.

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