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Casey Costello: Associate Health Minister on considering a review of the tobacco excise tax · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Customs taking action on illegal cigarettes, which more and more
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: people here are smoking.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: We do not want to get into a position in
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: New Zealand where, god the Australians are actually facing at
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: the moment, where there's standover tactics from organized crime groups
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: and certainly several homicides from that as well.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: All right, let's go to This is a six month
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: long investigation dubbed Operation Clarity. By the way, Casey Costello,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Customs Minister, Minister, good morning.
• 0:26
  Speaker 3: Good morning, Ryan.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: I suppose this is a good thing. That's probably a
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: bad thing because it tells us just how bad the
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: problem is. Right, lots of people are smoking illegal cigarettes
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: because we've made the regular ones so downe expensive.
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah, this is a part of the reason why our
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: response to the tobacco sector always had to be about
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: getting people to stop smoking because of the threat. And
• 0:47
  Speaker 3: so you know, this is a collective response. We need
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: to do more. More importantly, we need to public know
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: this isn't just about tax evasion. This is lyne in
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: the pockets of organized criminals.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: How many people like illegal cigarettes, because there was one
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: study that found something like forty percent of packets in
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: the bin were illegal ones.
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah, there's some studies that have done I mean those
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: studies really wouldn't widstand a huge amount of scretiny. What
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: we go by is the survey results which we do
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: every year around how many actual people are smoking. But
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: the prevalence is clear. It's why I was really concerned
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: about this reduced retailer network which we repealed when the
• 1:29
  Speaker 3: first came in, because if we've gone down to LEAs
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: and less legal locations, you'd end up with more and
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: more illegal locations of ap buying cigarettes. So the prevalence
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: is really difficult.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: To send point totally. And this influx is inevitable. I mean,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: it's happened in Australia, it's going to happen here. Our
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: taxes are even higher. It's fifty plus bucks for a
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: packet of cigarettes. So the only way and what's worse
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: are indeed's done this look at it. They said that
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: these illegal ones have even more harmful chemicals for people,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: including higher levels of uranium.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, this is the part that you know, you know,
• 2:03
  Speaker 3: this is what we need to tell the public. The
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: public have to be on board with this. We need
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: people to quit smoking. And what Australia did worse than
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: the x size tax is they made less harmful of
• 2:14
  Speaker 3: alternatives almost impossible to get. So they did both. They
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: taxed well higher than we are and anything that was
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: less harmful they made prescription only, so we ended up
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: with a double we mate, which is why they have
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: seen the massive loss of an excise that they have
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: and the criminal market that they've got.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: People aren't stupid, right, people are and key wes know
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: what they're doing with their bodies. At what point do
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: you say, do you say let's cut the excise on
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: actual tobacco because I would rather use smoke a cigarette
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: we know what's in it, rather than a uranium durry.
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: This is the last paper I look forward to increase
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: excise as we do every year. That's an annual process.
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: Was to review the exercise regime completely and so yeah,
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: that is part of the work that I'm doing as well,
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: and part.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: Of that would be considering reducing the excise on tobacco
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: if the alternative is that someone is smoking uranium cigarettes.
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: I think the point that you've got to make is
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: that we've reached the threshold where cost does not deter
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: people from smoking. So therefore we've got to look at
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: the other regimes that we've got to get people to
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: stop smoking. Okay, it is a huge cost to our
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: health system. We need people to stop smoking. This is
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: the biggest threat we've got to our fantastic smoke free targets.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: All right, but just to clarify because the opposition or
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: will go nuts over it. But it seems reasonable if
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: the alternative is uranium. You are considering reducing excise on cigarettes, I'm.
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: Considering a review of the exercise and that's what we
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: took forward to Kebinet that it's time that we've started
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: to consider a view on how our exercise structure is
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: for all of these products, and I think that that
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: is important.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: I appreciate your time this morning. That is the Customs
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: Minister Casey Costello.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: to News Talks it'd be from five am weekdays, or
• 4:16
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