Pat Conaghan (Cowper, National Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

Congratulations on your appointment, Deputy Speaker Lawrence. Last week, I went and visited a small corner-store business in one of my small towns in the electorate of Cowper. The business owner reminded me how bad government policy can kill small business. I won't name the business, because he is genuinely fearful of reprisals for what I'm about to talk about—and that is the increasing infestation of illicit tobacco and vape stores across Australia. This business isn't the first one to reach out to me; I get calls every week, particularly from small corner-store businesses that are being hammered. Their cash flow is being cut because of these illicit traders. Surely, Deputy Speaker Lawrence, you're hearing about this and your Labor colleagues and the crossbench are all hearing about this. We've heard the saying, 'Just because you say something doesn't make it true.' Simply saying that Australia has banned illicit tobacco and vaping products doesn't make them miraculously disappear.

In fact, it's not just propagated the whole industry but sent it to the black market. How can we possibly go from a retail landscape with a rapidly diminishing tobacco store footprint leading into 2020 to seeing a new shop popping up on every street, in every town? It just says to us the policy isn't working. Conversely, with all these new stores, how can we see tax revenue from tobacco decreasing? Logically, if more shops were legally selling regulated products, the government coffers would be growing alongside them. Yet, tobacco excise collections have collapsed to their lowest level in 14 years.

Now, I am the first to say I hate smoking, I hate vaping and I would love to see them go. But the fact is the policies that we have right now are not working. We're seeing firebombings in Sydney and Melbourne, and police do not have the resources to tackle this, nor do the state health authorities. And I'm very happy that the Assistant Treasurer is in the Federation Chamber today, because we've done the costings on legalising vaping, which would bring in about $7 billion to $9 billion a year. Regulate it, control it, and take it out of the hands of the crooks. I again say I hate smoking and vaping, but this policy is not working.

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