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A 'huge' trade-off: One Nation's pitch for cheaper cigarettes
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this post was submitted on 18 Aug 2026
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This is the only point that matters. Whatever the intention, the tax eventually failed. Somewhere in there was a point where the cessation of smoking planed out, then the vape ban did the rest. The black market really grew from then, to a point now where they’re being home delivered.
I’ve spoken to two cigarette smokers to get their anecdotal and they said they’d probably stop chasing BM cigarettes. Fortunately neither will vote for Hanson over it, but they’re under no doubt it’ll be a winner.
The tax is only failing due to the black market though isn't it?
So the question is why aren't the government destroying the black market?
With so many people buying black market cigarettes, it cannot be hard to make arrests, and trace sources.
Smoking laws could also be significantly tightened to include no smoking in public at all, as a start.
Doesn’t matter here, it’s exploitable for Hanson and will be even more so if they come down harder. Essentially though, you’re on the money.
I’ll be honest, the way they have delivery and mail order set up, I’m not sure if they can stop it now. They haven’t been able to lay a glove on it locally, I know this through the smokers I know. They can’t close the door of the local one because it takes phone numbers and there’s nothing to bust. The pickup times are 9-10pm at night, and some deliver as mentioned earlier.
It was always low hanging fruit. I told my smoker friends a month ago she’d do this. It’s money for jam.
makes you wonder what the next trick will be
Yeah, it does now that you mention it. They’ve covered online, phone and home delivery. The local distributors have a few locations as drop off zones. It’s a pretty tight ship.
There’s not a thing they can do about the shop down the road taking numbers. They can search it as much as they like but they’ll find nothing but papers, filters…all of which are good.
I worked for a business with an unusually high number of smokers last year, they were all buying black market cigarettes, apparently directly from a shop up the road.
"The shop down the road taking numbers" can be used to infiltrate the supply and distribution, if the police want to. Place an order, track the delivery vehicle back to their pick up location etc
Yeah possibly. They’re pretty sharp though, the police would want to be good undercover.
But yeah one of the weaknesses is the search and seizure powers being within the health department and not coppers
The coppers are buying illegal vapes
I was tempted to include a comment about the police not having racist moustaches etc, but I'm guessing the police look and act a lot like the customers anyway.
If black market tobacco is illegal, then the police need the power to stop it, if they have not been given that power, the question should be 'why?' If they have the power and are not using it, the question should be 'why?'
I was also tempted to suggest the police are not stopping the trade because it is where they get their winnie blues from.
At this point in time I am expecting 90% of the police are likely to vote for one nation, mcdonalds, zionism, or pedophile trump.
Agreed, hanson is just advertising shiny poo.