A Metropolis of Sydney spokeswoman mentioned a enterprise was required to inform NSW Well being and apply for a retailer identification quantity earlier than it began promoting tobacco, non-tobacco smoking merchandise or e-cigarettes.
“There isn’t any particular requirement to tell native councils of the intent to promote tobacco or smoking-related merchandise,” she mentioned.
Information from NSW Well being reveals 346,000 vaping merchandise have been seized from January 1 to September 30, 2023 – triple the variety of seizures in the identical interval in 2022.
NSW Well being Minister Ryan Park mentioned the state authorities was cracking down on retailers doing the flawed factor, nevertheless it was not simple to cope with vaping, which he known as “one of many greatest public well being challenges we face”.
Park additionally mentioned regulators had been gradual to reply to the move of vaping merchandise into the nation.
“We’ve a group that’s awash with these merchandise,” he mentioned.
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The importation of all disposable vapes with or with out nicotine was banned from January 1 as a part of a crackdown to cease a black market that imports thousands and thousands of flavoured disposable vapes from China.
From March, the federal authorities will impose a ban on folks importing their very own vaping merchandise and on the import of all non-therapeutic vapes.
Affiliate Professor Becky Freeman from the College of Sydney’s College of Public Well being mentioned the import ban didn’t forestall the sale of vapes already within the nation.
“As soon as the promised regulation is handed later in 2024 to ban the sale of all vape merchandise exterior of pharmacies, then that would be the dying knell of vape retailers,” she mentioned.
Nevertheless, Freeman mentioned the passage of legal guidelines to ban the sale of vapes was not assured.
“There are highly effective industrial forces that search to not solely forestall these legal guidelines from passing, but in addition to weaken them additional by permitting nicotine-containing vapes to be offered in retailers as leisure merchandise and eliminating the prescription requirement,” she mentioned.
A submission to a NSW parliamentary inquiry into e-cigarettes from the Australian Affiliation of Comfort Shops mentioned the federal government had misplaced management of the e-cigarette market and known as for regulated managed gross sales of vaping merchandise.
“Illicit operators brazenly promote vapes all through NSW in illegitimate shops, whereas others goal younger folks and kids by social media,” the submission mentioned.
Tremendous Vape Retailer has greater than 60 stores throughout Australia that can not be permitted to promote vaping merchandise if new legal guidelines are handed.
Tremendous Vape Retailer director Zack O’Hare mentioned a ban on retail gross sales of vapes would result in a thriving underground market, “with numerous unauthorised vape sellers conducting transactions with out adherence to any rules”.
O’Hare final month wrote to senators claiming Labor “persistently engages within the manipulation and suppression of essential data” concerning the vaping trade.
“Given {that a} vital majority of Australian adults specific a desire for regulating vapes akin to cigarettes, it appears prudent for the LNP to withstand what’s perceived as impractical insurance policies from the Labor Celebration, resulting in the emergence of an unregulated black market,” he mentioned.
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