NSW Premier Backs One Nation Push to Cut Tobacco Tax by 75 Percent

A photo illustration of black market cigarettes displayed in Melbourne, Australia on March 26, 2025. Asanka Ratnayake/Getty Images

New South Wales Premier Chris Minns has backed a One Nation call to slash tobacco taxes as another price hike is due next month.

“Well to be honest with you, I’ve been calling for the same thing for about a year. So it would be pretty disingenuous to come after One Nation agreed with that policy and say they’re wrong. So I am not going to say that,” he said on ABC.

Minns said instead of reducing smoking, the tax made legal products less accessible and left people turning to illicit supplies in large numbers.

“So look, I just we need a rethink on this. The excise isn’t working. It’s driving underground black market in cigarettes and it’s really a source of funding and organised crime in New South Wales,” Minns added.

The federal government will increase the tobacco tax on Sept. 1 this year, tagging it to the national average wage rate.

Smokers currently pay about $1.53 in tax per cigarette, or $30.57 for a standard 20 pack.

The rise will lift the tax to roughly $1.55 per stick, taking the government’s take per pack to $31.00.

One Nation Plan to Cut Tobacco Tax by 75 Percent

Minn’s comment comes after One Nation leader Pauline Hanson pledged to remove the tobacco tax by 75 percent and pause indexation for three years.

Under One Nation’s plan, a $46.50 legal pack would drop to about $21 or $22, making it competitive with illicit cigarettes.

Hanson said the move would come with tougher border enforcement and penalties for traffickers.

“This is not about encouraging smoking. It is about restoring the rule of law and breaking the black market,” she said.

But Health Minister Mark Butler rejected the proposal as a “thought bubble,” insisting the primary goal of tobacco policy was to drive down smoking rates.

He pointed to data showing about half a million Australians quit smoking daily in the past three or four years, leaving the country with one of the lowest rates in the world.

“We should be very pleased with that, while recognising still that about 20,000 Australians die every year because of smoking-related complications,” Butler told reporters.

Butler recognised there was a “really seriously law and order issue.”

“Yes, we’re thinking very carefully about how to crack down on these criminals and put them out of business. But from a health perspective, I’m pleased that smoking rates are continuing to come down,” he said on Aug. 19.