Radio interview with Minister Butler and Ali Moore, ABC Melbourne Drive - 11 December 2024

ALI MOORE, HOST: Well, the country's first ever Illicit Tobacco Symposium was held in Melbourne today. Law enforcement, health and regulatory authorities talking about how to tackle the problem. So what did they come up with and why is it that authorities can't get on top of it? Mark Butler is the Federal Health Minister. Mark Butler, welcome back to Drive.
 
MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND AGED CARE, MARK BUTLER: Thanks, Ali.
 
MOORE: You just heard there what Theo Foukkare had to say. Is there anything from today's meeting and today's talks that will lead to a change?
 
BUTLER: They're still going on. I attended for about an hour and was delighted at the fact that we had several dozen officials from every jurisdiction, from health, from policing, we had the Criminal Intelligence Commission there sharing their experiences, coming to grips with this really devilish problem that we have here. It's a huge health problem.  I'm particularly focused on vapes  because the only cohort that is seeing smoking rates increase are our youngest members of the community.  Vapes have become a gateway into cigarette smoking. Vapes in and of themselves are incredibly unhealthy for young Australians. And if it's not enough for us to have to fight Big Tobacco on that, we've also now got serious organised crime, deeply involved in the trade, not just of vapes, but as your introduction said, illicit tobacco as well. This is an incredibly, lucrative source of revenue for organised crime to bankroll their other criminal activities like sex trafficking and drug trafficking.
 
We've had some of the best minds coming together. They're still talking now, sharing their experiences, sharing their ideas about how to enforce the laws, particularly that Parliament passed a few months ago around vaping.
 
MOORE: I guess, though, particularly for people, you know, listening to this in Melbourne, it's hard to understand why more progress hasn't been made. I mean, we see we now that Victoria Police and they've told us that they've identified some of the, you know, the national and the global organised crime syndicates that are involved. We see some people named, photographed, and media reports. And yet still it seems that they walk the streets. We had another firebombing just yesterday morning. It seems that whatever effort is being made, it's not making a dent in the problem?
 
BUTLER: Firebombing has started to spread across the country. I'm seeing it in my home state of South Australia. We're seeing it in other jurisdictions as well. All I can say is authorities recognise the depth of that problem and are starting to put in place enforcement action. Just last week, I know it's not your state, but we had raids of a number of businesses in WA infringement notice there's hundreds of thousands of dollars of fines, 60,000 vapes seized. What I said to the officials who are working so hard at this are battling Big Tobacco, battling big organised crime all at the same time is we've got to move to prosecutions. The fines that we passed in the parliament earlier this year, they're big. They're more than $2 million fines for individuals, fines of more than $20 million for businesses or corporations, and very serious jail time as well. Now, prosecutions do take a little while to prepare. We want to make sure they're successful, not fail in court. But I do say again, I think people expect we have to move to starting to put people in court and if need be in jail for this.
 
MOORE: And, I guess, I mean, this is a point you made today in your speech. You said choking off supply at the borders was the first step. Steps two, three and four: enforcement, enforcement, enforcement, enforcement. Is there actually enough of that in a state like Victoria? Are there enough literally boots on the ground?
 
BUTLER: That's really a question for the state of Victoria. They’re certainly signed up to this program and I know all jurisdictions are putting in place extra resources for this. Today I announced on behalf of the Commonwealth, an additional $107 million to double down our enforcement and interception activities, but also to bolster resources for prosecutions for the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions. We want to see prosecutions at state and territory level as well. The whole reason this has become more than just a fight against Big Tobacco, but also a fight against serious organised crime, is for the last several years they've seen this as a low risk, high reward business for them. We've got to change that equation. We've got to make sure that they understand this is high risk and if caught, the penalties are such that they outweigh the benefit of making some money off the fact that kids are continuing to vape.
 
MOORE: You made the point, Mark Butler, that the firebombing is not just in Victoria. It's spread to your home state in South Australia. Does that mean that we have failed to make the point that it's not low risk, high reward?
 
BUTLER: This is a work in progress, is the point I'll make, Ali. The right time to start this was 4 or 5 years ago, but we didn't. The second best time to start it has been this year. We've done an enormous amount of work this year. We  started to choke off supply at the border by putting in place an import control. We've seized millions of vapes. There's much more for us to do there. We've changed the law so that it's illegal to sell these things. Vape stores are closing. I know in my own community, every single vape store that was opened over the last several years is now closed, and nine out of ten them are, as I think your news report said were set up within walking distance of schools very deliberately. But we now see this being sold through convenience stores and tobacco stores. And I heard, the tobacco lobbyists, sorry the retail store lobbyists talk about this. It's not just illegal stores. We know this stuff is being sold by otherwise legitimate convenience stores and tobacconists as well. That's frankly, a much harder job than going around and shutting down the stores that have quite openly set up to sell vapes.
 
MOORE: Is there, though, and you heard what Theo Foukkare said from the Australian Association of Convenience Stores. But is there an issue here around what government can do to help protect legitimate businesses? I mean, like it or not, selling tobacco, legal tobacco that you pay tax on is a perfectly legal business operation. And yet they seem, you know, as I said again, just yesterday, we saw arsonists destroy a business, a perfectly legal business?
 
BUTLER: That's right. We've seen this in other areas where organised crime is involved, whether it's crowd control in hotels over the years or now, this because they see this as a really important source of revenue. We do have to protect legitimate businesses. Legitimate businesses have to do the right thing as well, though. They have to sell legitimate product; they can't continue to sell as too many of them are illegitimate product. It's about changing that risk reward equation for all businesses. But it is, you're right about,  policing authorities making sure they do whatever they can to protect good, hard working, legitimate businesses. Often small businesses, family owned, who are putting their livelihoods on the line to make a buck out of what are legitimate businesses. And at moment, they're coming under an enormous amount of pressure from serious organised crime. I know, having talked to my health minister colleagues at our meeting last week as well, that those jurisdictions that aren't currently operating a licencing regime for the sale of tobacco. As has become pretty uniform, not just Victoria, but a number are looking at changing that as well because that certainly improves the ability to separate the wheat from the chaff.
 
MOORE: Can I say yes, we will have a licencing scheme introduced in this state. But Minister, just a final question. Given how intractable this problem appears to be, have you had any thought at all regarding excise, or are you steadfast that you wouldn't reduce the tax on tobacco to try and even the scales somewhat?
 
BUTLER: I know some put the argument to me we should just make legitimate cigarettes cheaper. First of all, every piece of advice I have is that would increase rates of smoking. I accept we have a devilish problem in front of us right now. But every piece of advice I get would be that cheaper cigarettes means more smoking. But also I'm not going to have our public health and our taxation policies set by effectively criminal organisations and criminal activity. Our job is to combat the criminal activity and defend good public health policy. Right across the world, every piece of advice says that price signals around smoking are probably the most effective tool in the toolbox to bring down rates of smoking.
 
MOORE: Mark Butler, I appreciate your time. Thank you very much.
 
BUTLER: Thanks, Ali.