Up in smoke: NSW Labor closes Sydney stores in illegal tobacco raids

Two stores in north Sydney were the first to be raided and immediately closed on Tuesday as the Minns government uses new powers to target the explosion in illicit tobacco and illegal vaping.

The St Leonards stores were shut for 90 days under sweeping powers given to NSW Health to enforce closure orders for shops selling illicit tobacco, illegal vaping goods or tobacco without a licence.

More raids will be executed across NSW on Wednesday.

NSW Health inspectors found and seized 3860 illicit cigarettes and 224 illegal vapes in Tuesday’s raids on the Pacific Highway stores and during inspections of another two premises. Further investigations will follow and enforcement action, including prosecution, may take place.

NSW Health secretary Susan Pearce can also apply to the Local Court to make a long-term closure order of up to 12 months if satisfied a relevant breach has occurred.

As well as the new closure powers, the government’s changes to the Public Health (Tobacco) Act have increased the maximum penalties for anyone caught selling products without a licence to $660,000 for individuals, and $880,000 for a corporation.

Speaking to ABC Sydney on Tuesday morning, Premier Chris Minns took aim at the federal government’s excise tax on tobacco, which he has repeatedly blamed for the rise in black market tobacco and vaping.

The latest data from the Australian Tax Office valued the tobacco black market at almost $3.2 billion in 2023-24. However, the ATO warned that the real figure could be far higher, saying its own numbers were ­“unreliable”.

Minns said smoking levels now resembled the 1990s, and it had become commonplace again for workers to congregate outside office blocks to smoke.

“It’s genuinely a return to 1991 and the leading reason for that is the federal government’s excise, which has gone from $16 a packet to $29 a packet, a packet of 20 cigarettes,” Minns said.

“Now a legal packet of 20 cigarettes costs 50 bucks, and you can pick up an illegal packet of cigarettes for $13.”

Minns said the government “had put police on the job” but resources could not be at the expense of “confronting domestic violence, keeping the public safe and dealing with entrenched crime”.

“We are making that decision [to deploy police] because we can’t allow this to run rampant,” he said.

“But if you look at the economics of this, we are effectively providing a subsidised, cheap, widely available, ubiquitous tobacco industry that is untaxed. And the obvious thing has happened here, and that is, there’s been an explosion in tobacco use.”

Health Minister Ryan Park said the government would continue to raid and shut down shopfronts suspected of not complying with new tobacco and vaping laws.

“To be sure, this will take some time as we ramp up our closure activities, but this is just the beginning. More will follow in the coming days, weeks and months,” Park said.

“If you’re doing the wrong thing, sooner or later we will come for you.”

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