From: The West Australian
Tobacco smugglers could face up to 10 years in jail on top of existing financial penalties under proposed changes to Australia’s customs regime.
Attorney-General Nicola Roxon on Thursday used World No Tobacco Day to announce the government would introduce legislation to strengthen the Customs Act by the end of 2012.
The changes will create a new offence of “smuggling tobacco or conveying or possessing smuggled tobacco”.
At present tobacco smugglers are prosecuted under a general smuggling provision with financial penalties ranging up to five times the amount of duty evaded.
“These new penalties will send a clear message to smugglers that they risk spending significant time in jail by bringing illegal tobacco into the country,” Ms Roxon said in a statement on Thursday.
Some 82 million illegal cigarettes were seized by customs in 2010/11. But the government notes that’s a small percentage of the 20 billion cigarettes smoked last financial year.
The move to crack down on tobacco smuggling comes as cigarette manufacturers argue Labor’s plain packaging push could make it easier for counterfeit smokes to enter Australia.
The parliament late last year passed world-first laws requiring all tobacco products to be sold in drab olive-brown packs from December 2012.
A lower house health committee in August 2011 rejected the argument that plain packs could result in a spike in contraband product.
“The committee notes Australia has a strong customs and quarantine regime and there are also a range of sophisticated anti-counterfeiting measures which could be adopted,” it said in a report backing plain packaging.
