AACS: IT’S TIME TO STOP DEMONISING LAW-ABIDING AUSTRALIANS

July 19, 2018: The health lobby is extremely good at securing an anti-smoker headline but its ignorance when it comes to the root problem of illicit tobacco is breathtaking.
Illicit tobacco now accounts for approximately 15% of tobacco consumed in Australia, according to the Illicit Tobacco in Australia 2017 Full Year Report produced by KPMG LLP, which means criminal gangs enjoy a disturbing amount of control of the total tobacco market.
The Australian Government missed out on over $1.9 billion in tax revenue last year as a result.
Today’s media reports of groups including Quit Victoria calling for increased bans on smoking plays directly into the hands of these criminals, says Australasian Association of Convenience Stores (AACS) CEO Jeff Rogut.
“It’s time to stop demonising people for exercising their freedom of choice and consuming a legal product. If we do this, we also help to guard against criminals who have proven to be remarkably effective in flooding local communities with illegal cigarettes,” says Mr Rogut.
“Every time we make it more expensive for adults to buy legal tobacco, or make it harder for law-abiding people to make purchases, we make it easier and more profitable for criminals involved in black market trade.
“Plain packaging is another example. Lauded as the much-awaited solution to smoking, in reality, plain packaging has had no discernible impact on tobacco consumption in Australia. It’s simply another layer of regulation that impacts retailers of legal tobacco while creating additional opportunities for those in the illicit trade.
“These latest suggestions from the health lobby are even more economically damaging than we usually see. If you seek to effectively ban smoking in Victoria, the increase in cross border trade will obviously increase, and the flow-on impacts to sectors like tourism will be highly significant.
“Today, drug addicts will take ice into injecting rooms into Victoria and feel safe and free to feed their habit. Elsewhere we have educated people seeking to make life harder for adults who choose to consume a legal product.
“The hypocrisy of this position is alarming but the economic implications demand genuine attention,” he says.
Legal tobacco is a significant contributor to a typical convenience store’s sales and convenience store operators are trained responsible retailers of age-restricted products like tobacco. This will ideally soon extend to e-cigarettes – products proven internationally to be highly effective in helping people to quit tobacco.
“If organisations like Quit Victoria are serious about encouraging people to quit smoking they should be advocating for e-cigarette products to be legally available as stop-smoking devices,” Mr Rogut says.
“There is an abundance of international research pointing to the effectiveness of e-cigarettes in helping people quit traditional tobacco, and according to authorities like Public Health England, they are much safer to consume.
“Instead of demonising people who choose to consume legal tobacco, why don’t these groups consider the available evidence on e-cigarettes and seek to offer people a helpful alternative?
“By making alternative e-cigarettes more readily available we can offer people a choice to help them quit, and potentially shift the focus from traditional tobacco. The longer e-cigarettes are unable to be legally sold, the more likely the black market will fill this gap too.”
Further information:
Jeff Rogut
Chief Executive Officer
Australasian Association of Convenience Stores
Ph: +61 467 873 789
Media enquiries:
Stephen Naylor
Wise McBaron Communication
Ph: +61 (2) 9279 4770