Tobacco Wars: Retailers Using Smoke and Mirrors to Justify Excise Call
MEDIA RELEASE 18 JULY 2026
I doubt we'll hear much from tobacco retailers about the recent media release from the AIHW, which clearly shows the success of the Commonwealth Government's approach to taxing tobacco out of existence.
Tasmania’s tobacco retailers are using smoke and mirrors to protect their turf. Smoking is good for business. Their argument to reduce the excise on tobacco has nothing to do with smoking rates, which they don't want to fall, and everything to do with protecting their profits.
There's nothing wrong with wanting to protect your trade – but it shouldn't come at the expense of a public health measure that is clearly succeeding in reducing smoking rates. And reducing smoking rates saves us all, in the long run, from the huge financial burden smoking places on our health system.
It's highly concerning that Health Minister Bridget Archer has decided to sing from the songbook of the tobacco industry and its lobbyists and call on the Federal Government to reduce the tobacco excise. Has the Minister for Health forgotten that tobacco-related illness clogs our hospital beds, kills two in three of its users, and is cause for the premature death of over 500 Tasmanians a year?
Minister Archer must put the health of Tasmanians first and listen to public health experts – the AMA, Quit Tasmania and Cancer Council – who are warning that Australia is in a critical window, with a real risk the data will be misrepresented and used by big tobacco and industry front groups to justify weakening effective tobacco control policies.
As Quit Tasmania Director Abby Smith wrote in the Mercury on 8 July, tobacco excise is one of the most effective public health measures we have: it's proven to stop young people from taking up smoking, and it encourages people who smoke to quit.
If the Health Minister is serious about her health revolution – the 20-year preventive health strategy – she needs to listen to public health experts, not tobacco merchants. I urge Minister Archer to get moving on the next tranche of reforms to the Public Health Act to reduce the number of licit and illicit tobacco retailers and their visibility.
All tobacco kills, whether it's taxed or not. A sensible public health response would seek to reduce all tobacco sales, legal and illegal alike, and the stats are clear:
1. The number of daily smokers has fallen sharply
In 2025, 5.6% of people aged 14 and over smoked daily – down from 19.5% in 2001 and 8.3% in 2022–23.
The decline was also evident among adults aged 18 and over, with daily smoking dropping from 20.1% in 2001 and 8.8% in 2022–23 to 5.8% in 2025. Similar rates of reduction were recorded among those who smoke regularly but less than daily.
2. E-cigarette use has plateaued since restrictions were introduced last year
New 2025 data show daily e-cigarette use has remained stable since 2022–23, a shift from the previously increasing trend (3.6%).
Fewer people are also using e-cigarettes weekly and monthly, meaning the overall proportion of Australians currently using e-cigarettes has declined to 6.0%.
3. Illicit tobacco use continues to rise
New 2025 data show one in three people (34%) aged 14 and over who currently smoke have used illicit tobacco recently, compared with around one in six (16.7%) in 2022–23.
More than half of those who purchased branded illicit tobacco reported buying it from a tobacconist (57%).
The Health Minister needs to show the same courage she displayed as a federal member and stand up against the vested interests within her own party.