No sign of an illicit tobacco crackdown in Gippsland towns

ON WEDNESDAY, September 9, the State Government announced that “the doors are closing on Victoria’s illicit tobacco trade with Labor’s tough new closure powers now law”.

With a budget allocation of $13.4 million, the government said it was tripling the number of inspectors, “putting more boots on the ground to target dodgy operators”.

So far, none have been closed down in South Gippsland or Bass Coast or anywhere else in regional Victoria, for that matter.

On day one, September 9, they closed three shops, all of them in Footscray.

In the first week of the so-called crackdown, the government’s Tobacco Licensing Victoria (TLV) taskforce had closed eight, the three in Footscray and five others in the Melbourne CBD and the inner east.

In the second week, they took action against 13 more, mostly in the city and the inner east, with three others in the Tarneit and Spotswood area.

By September 23, they’d published the names and locations of 38 outlets, all of which had been issued with “short term” closure notices, extending out to the first few weeks of December 2026.

But despite finding illicit tobacco on the premises, seeing it sold and in many cases, witnessing tobacco being sold without any licence whatsoever, they were only able to close the venues down temporarily, for three months.

According to Victoria Police, there are 1300 standalone tobacco stores in Victoria, and of those, 1000 sell some kind of illicit tobacco.

If the “short-term” closures continue at the present rate, the taskforce will be able to issue notices to fewer than 300 more illicit tobacco shops before they start reopening again.

By that time, the Carroll State Government will have kicked the can down the road, past the next state election date on Saturday, November 28.

Check out the illicit tobacco shops which have been the subject of short-term closure since September 9 HERE

It’s a scenario that Monash Federal MP Mary Aldred predicted when she heard of the new laws being introduced by the Victorian government.

In an interview on ABC Gippsland Radio on September 10, Ms Aldred was critical of both the Victorian and Federal governments initiatives at breaking up what is a $10 billion-a-year trade for organised crime.

“We had the Victorian government's announcement yesterday, which I've read through, and it seems to me they've reheated something and just added a bit of garnish and put it out,” said Ms Aldred.

“The issue remains in Victoria around the difficulty of landlords to terminate leases, where they come across having an illegal tobacco shop in their premises.

“Often, someone will go into a shop and say it's a convenience store or a gift shop, and then it turns out that they're selling illegal products. One of the triggers for closure for them to be able to terminate a lease needs to be a long-term closure order, which only a magistrate can provide and only the police can apply for.

“So, they've made a big song and dance about these new powers for tobacco licensing Victoria to do that, which I'm not sure that they can under these new powers that have been announced, because previously they could only provide short-term closure orders, which doesn't trigger the ability for the landlord to terminate the lease,” she said.

“And the other issue is Tobacco Licensing Victoria officers have to work in teams of two, so that effectively halves the boosted number on the streets they've been referring to.

“So really, I think you've probably got a team of 20 to cover the entire state.

“I will be really interested to see how many illegal tobacco shops they're actually able to close,” said Ms Aldred.

“But I know in question time this week, the Federal Government made much about the Victorian Labor government's inability to get a hold of this problem, because Victoria is seen as being particularly bad in its ability to tackle the illegal tobacco trade and the crime and the violence that’s a consequence.”

Ms Aldred also went on to discuss the fact that organised crime has a 97% stranglehold on the vape market in Australia, selling products with no mandated dose control or what the devices contain.

“The legal vape framework, which we have in Australia at the moment is a pharmacy only model, but we've got about 700 pharmacies in Australia, and my understanding is about 35 of them stock legal vapes,” said Ms Aldred.

“Now they have a particular dosage, and if you talk to people like Dr Nick Coatsworth, the former Deputy Chief Health Officer of Australia, and Dr Nick's actually a respiratory specialist as well, so you couldn't get a better qualified medical doctor to talk about this.

“He says legal vapes are a really important bridge for people who want to quit smoking because combusting tobacco is the worst thing you can be doing, smoking cigarettes. But as a bridge to harm minimisation, which public health advocates seem to accept harm minimisation in many other scenarios, that is an important part of being able to quit.

“So that's why we've said providing a legal vape framework with manufacturing and dose standards is part of our overall package of policies from the Coalition.”

Ms Aldred said the government needed to take a Swiss Army knife approach to the illicit tobacco and vape trade in Australia if they wanted to stamp out infiltration of organised crime and the trail of offending the revenue generated, not only the fire-bombings, car thefts, murder and extortion but also, in at least one case, terrorism on Australia soil.

She said as well as reducing the excise, enabling otherwise law-abiding citizens to return to buying legal cigarettes and vapes, such an initiative would go hand in hand with quit smoking education and programs with the aim of reducing smoking from the government’s own target figure of 10% to the Coalition’s goal of 5%.

“But I'll say this as well; I don't like cigarette companies. My grandfather passed away from smoking-induced lung cancer. Like many families, I've seen the first-hand consequences of their products.

“But you know what I like less than cigarette companies; sex trafficking, illegal arms dealing, terrorists, and all of the fire-bombings and ram raids.

“In a Sydney hospital this week, there's a young man in the burns’ unit because, in a case of mistaken identity, he was caught up in an arson attack. We've had people literally murdered as part of this. This week, particularly, there's been armed home invasions in South Australia, and in Melbourne. We can’t keep going on like this.

“The first role of any government is to keep Australians safe, and that is getting out of control when you look at the impact of the illegal tobacco market right now.

“We cannot keep going down this path. That is why I am calling, and the coalition are calling for change.”

Ms Aldred, the chair of the Liberal Party’s illicit tobacco task force, said that not only was the Federal Government presiding over a massive loss in tobacco excise, upwards of a staggering $23 billion by 2029 and huge pay day for organised crime, the cheap, illegal cigarettes were now starting to drive up smoking rates.

What happens to shops selling illicit tobacco

Here’s what happens when Tobacco Licensing Victoria and Victoria Police issue a closure notice:

The premises must stop operating completely until the closure ends.

This means that:

• A premises cannot sell any products – the closure is not just limited to tobacco products
• No one can enter a closed premises without lawful authority
• TLV will clearly display a closure notice or order at the premises
• TLV will add information about the premises to its list of closed shops.

From September 9, Tobacco Licensing Victoria and Victoria Police have new powers to disrupt the illicit tobacco trade.

• They can close any premises where illicit tobacco is being sold, supplied or possessed. This includes both licensed and unlicensed premises.
• This can stop businesses from selling illicit tobacco while they consider other enforcement action, including prosecution.
• Significant penalties apply to anyone who enters, operates from or makes a sale from premises that the TLV closes.
• These powers and penalties help protect legitimate businesses that comply with the law.

Businesses that ignore closure orders face fines of up to $2.5 million and 20 years’ jail. Illicit tobacco fuels organised crime, undercuts legitimate businesses and puts Victorians at risk.

“We’re cracking down on illicit tobacco and the organised crime gangs it funds by giving our inspectors and police the powers to hit them where it hurts,” said Minister for Police Paul Edbrooke.

So far, there’s no sign of any crackdown on illicit tobacco sale in regional area, short-term or otherwise.