Customs and Other Legislation Amendment (Illicit Tobacco Enforcement Modernisation and Other Measures) Bill 2026

Mr PASIN (Barker) (16:31): It's certainly a different perspective when you're in the galleries. I had the great honour just a few moments ago to accompany young students from St Joseph's School Murray Bridge into the chamber. They watched the member for Berowra draw the Speaker to the state of the House.

They were interested about why people piled into the chamber and were then just as interested in why they piled out. In any event, having explained the nature of proceedings in this building, I'm down here making a contribution. I wanted to mention the students from Murray Bridge because overnight in the commercial precinct of Murray Bridge, we had a commercial building set alight.

It was an arson attack. I've had the great privilege of representing the community of Murray Bridge for some 13 years, and I'm happy to say that arson of commercial buildings is not something that is common in or around the CBD of Murray Bridge yet last night it occurred. A local journalist has reached out to me.

His suspicion is that it might be related to the illicit tobacco trade. We can't confirm that, but I'll be sure to update the House. It is perhaps likely given the circumstances that this is yet another example of the livelihoods of people living in regional communities being put at risk by this illicit trade.

While I'm talking about Murray Bridge, recently a social media video of mine attracted substantial attention. It was simply a video of two packets of cigarettes. One was an illegal packet that on which no excise was paid and another was a legitimate packet of cigarettes.

Both were packets of 20. One cost $20 cash—no receipt, I'm told—and the other costs something in the order of $50. That social media video got something in the order of 800,000 views.

But what happened in response, I expect from that video or attention otherwise, is that the illegal cigarette shops at Murray Bridge were raided. Now, that is appropriate and the right thing to do. But what I want to draw the House's attention to is my understanding from people living in Murray Bridge that the very next day or the day after, one of those illegal tobacco shops was open again.

It was selling tobacco not out of the premises but out of the tin shed out the back. I want to draw that example to the House's attention because, as a former criminal barrister, police would often say to me, 'We're not going to be able to prosecute our way out of—insert particular criminal offence perpetrated by serious and organised crime.' That is the case here.

Serious and organised crime has entered and now dominates the illegal tobacco industry. Those opposite have created an environment in which there is an economic incentive, and that incentive is being enjoyed by criminals. And, whilst the coalition supports the bill's measures, we want to be very clear.

These measures don't go far enough. Quite frankly, you can close down as many shops, you can strengthen enforcement and you can modernise those measures, but, if you take action and within days the serious and organised crime gangs that are selling these illegal cigarettes or illicit tobacco to Australians open up again, then quite frankly we're just on this merry-go-round.

So what is the coalition's solution? The coalition's solution is to take away that economic incentive, to reduce it by reducing excise on illicit tobacco. You won't smash the crime gangs unless you smash their business model.

There's this fallacy that serious and organised criminals are people that don't understand business or don't have high degrees of business efficacy. Can I tell you, as someone who worked in criminal law, that is a fallacy. The way to crush these gangs and their activity in illicit tobacco trade is to take away the economic and financial commercial incentives for them to do so, and that's exactly what the coalition's plan will do.

As we just heard, that's not the only thing we'll do. We'll strengthen enforcements. We'll move to legitimise and legalise vapes.

All of that will move what is a substantial commercial trade from the hands of organised criminals back into the hands of businesses that employ locals, businesses that pay staff appropriately and businesses that take the kinds of measures that are required to ensure young Australians don't access these products in circumstances where they're not—and, quite frankly, shouldn't be—permitted to do so.

If a young person enters one of these illegal tobacco shops, I don't reckon anyone is checking for ID. They're not checking for ID. I know there have been some opponents, including those opposite, who say: 'You're just going to create a new generation of Australian smokers.

Smoking rates are in decline.' Cigarettes in this country have never been cheaper. I'm not happy about that, but I'm not blind to the reality of it. They have never been cheaper and, I'd argue, have never been more accessible.

So, for those opposite and others in academia and NGOs to suggest that smoking rates in this country are in decline, I really think they need to spend more time where young people are. I, on occasion, do—football clubs, sporting organisations, front bars and other places—and I don't think smoking rates are in decline. I think smoking rates of legitimate cigarettes, those on which excise are paid, are certainly in decline.

I heard a figure referenced then, but I've seen other figures that would suggest four out of every five cigarettes sold in this country are illegal. We've got to smash these business models. Has anyone done some time thinking about what serious and organised crime put that revenue towards?

I think we can accept there is more revenue flowing to these organisations courtesy of this trade than you can fly a rocket ship over. But has anyone paused for a minute to say, 'What will they apply that resource to?' I don't think they're building playgrounds. I don't think they're funding schools.

They're certainly not funding hospitals. It's being diverted into activity that, by its very nature, no-one—and I mean no-one—in this place wants to see encouraged. Now, when I was studying economics—I think it was 1995 at Flinders University.

The member for Berowra will appreciate this: I did it to get some casual relief from my studies of the law. If someone had told me in macroeconomics 101 that you could reduce a tax by 80 per cent—tobacco excise is a tax—and drive up government revenues by $6 billion to $8 billion, I would have told them they'd spent a bit too much time down at the university bar and that they might have been smoking but it wasn't tobacco.

But that's the reality here. The reality is that we've gone so far past the curve, we have created such a gap between legal and illegal products, that we can reduce excise on tobacco and yet we'll raise billions of dollars in additional revenue, which we can spend on the kinds of things that serious and organised crime absolutely won't spend it on. I've had the great privilege of being the member for Barker for a tick over 13 years now, and, in all my time in this place, I don't think I can remember another time where a policy put to the Australian people had so much upside: more revenue for government; less money in the hands of organised criminals; making it harder for people under the age of 18 to access these products, because, of course, supermarkets and other things are going to be very careful about complying with the law for fear that they might lose licences and other activity; more jobs; less money in the cash economy; more money to legitimate businesses that pay tax otherwise—taxes over and above the excise that's on the packet of cigarettes; more money for businesses that support community sport and other organisations, which is so critical in rural, regional and remote Australia, the likes of which I represent across the electorate of Barker.

Win, win, win, win. If there was ever an opportunity for those opposite to extend the hand and simply say, 'Let's agree that this is a good approach,' this is it. Like I said, it's less money in the hands of criminals; more money in the hands of government in terms of tax receipts; making it more difficult for people who ought not, must not and should not be accessing this product to access it; more money in the hands of legitimate businesses that pay tax—again, more revenue to government—and that employ Australians and do it legitimately and appropriately.

Win, win, win, win. When I get the opportunity, I will update the House on whether the arson that took place in Murray Bridge overnight was a consequence of this illicit trade. If it was, I'll remind the House that, in addition to all the harm I mentioned, this trade is putting the lives and livelihoods of Australians at risk.

It is not an uncommon sight now, on our news bulletins of an evening, to see that a delicatessen or a small retail shop has been set alight. I'm not suggesting that it relates to this illicit trade in every case, but I am suggesting that a whopping proportion of them do. There is a serious turf war going on all over this country.

The people who are running this trade are rotten, mean and nasty, and they will stop at nothing. The first responsibility of government and those of us in this place is to keep Australians safe, so the action that we must take—not that we could take or should take—is to strip these criminals of the revenue model that they're operating. We've got to smash their business model, because seeking to prosecute or enforce our way through this to the other side simply won't work.

As I said at the beginning of this contribution, one of these illegal stores was shut down in Murray Bridge, only to open up days later. These criminals are agile, and the only way to beat them is to smash their business model. That's our proposal.

It'll be good for Australians. It'll be good for Australia. It's putting Australians first, and it's not before time that those opposite reconsider their position and adopt ours.