Editor’s Note: For more information about Australia’s plain packaging policy, please see here, here, here, here, and here.
From: City A.M.
The nanny statists have been proven wrong – plain cigarette packaging does not work
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Five years ago, critics of the policy had three major concerns. We said that plain packaging wouldn’t affect people’s decision to smoke, it would be a boost to the illicit trade, and it would lead to a slippery slope of regulation in which every product that displeases nanny statists would become fair game.
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A huge tobacco smuggling syndicate was busted in August this year, when 570 police officers raided homes and businesses across Sydney. Multi-million dollar tobacco crops are regularly discovered in the outback, but for every tonne of tobacco that is intercepted, many more tonnes make it to the streets.
