Planning change a needed weapon against illegal tobacco trade

1 month ago 18

Editorial

January 18, 2026 — 5.00am

This summer’s crackdown by the Minns government on the tobacco trade, with raids on retail outlets across NSW suspected of selling illicit cigarettes and vapes, risks being undermined by planning law loopholes.

For every NSW premises shut down, current rules allow black marketeers to open up next door or down the road as a new retail outlet and stay in business.

A tobacconist on the Pacific Highway at St Leonards is among dozens shuttered by inspectors.

It is just another example of the un-coordinated efforts by levels of government and the unintended consequences that have thwarted attempts to rein in the pernicious impact of the tobacco trade on the nation’s health and organised crime.

The Albanese government’s laudable attempt to use tax as a public health measure to break the lethal grip of tobacco has blown up in the faces of state governments. The soaring prices have driven smokers to cheaper illegal tobacco products, invariably provided by organised crime, and foisted the burden of controlling the burgeoning illegal trade on beleaguered state health departments or police forces.

The rush to the black market means at least half of Australia’s tobacco trade is made up of illicit cigarettes, costing taxpayers up to $11.8 billion a year. It has also prompted a surge in the number of gang-related firebombings of tobacco outlets around the country. Since the new year, a number of illegal tobacco stores have been set on fire in Perth, the escalating violence making neighbouring businesses fearful they will suffer collateral damage.

In NSW, authorities armed with new tough laws have carried out more than 50 raids, with NSW Health confiscating goods and issuing 90-day closure orders – as well as seeking court orders for 12-month orders. Many of the businesses were outside Sydney.

But it’s certainly an arduous way to dismantle the black market.

Despite the new laws, Local Government NSW, along with councils including Northern Beaches, Mosman, Glen Innes and Shoalhaven, have written to the government pointing out current planning allows tobacco businesses to proliferate courtesy of a simple change-of-use applications under broad categories such as “retail premises” or “shop”.

Inner West Council mayor and president of Local Government NSW Darcy Byrne said tobacconists should be forced to lodge development applications.

“They should be treated the same way as bottle shops, which have to submit detailed development applications with social impact analysis studies which means, for example, if there are three bottle shops operating in a certain area, councils can refuse a fourth,” he said.

Something has to be done. The raids are welcome but are a drop in the ocean.

Last May, the Herald’s Lucy Macken and Riley Walter reported that Sydney’s streets had become consumed by smoke shops, with 60 tobacconists for every McDonald’s. In the inner west, 824 tobacconists and vape stories popped up, while across the state there were some 20,000 outlets, up from 19,000 the year before.

Few want more tobacco shops in their neighbourhoods, and the proposed DA requirement to open a business is a worthy way of slowing the pestilent boom.