Murray Olds: Australian correspondent on keeping gas in the country and the rising tobacco black-market

Australia has announced plans to force gas companies to keep more fuel onshore. 

The Labor Government is set to announce an east coast gas reservation scheme in the coming weeks with the hopes it will lower gas and energy prices in the country. 

Meanwhile, raising tobacco prices has come back to bite the Government as the black market grows exponentially.

Australian correspondent Murray Olds told Heather du Plessis-Allan, "here's the thing ... a packet of durries can be bought for $10 or $12 so the government tax take is down dramatically to $7 billion this year."

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Murray Old's Assie corresponds with us right now, Hello, MS,
very good afternoon, Heather. Right, so you're going to be
forced to keep your gas on shore as we bloody
well should wa. Western Australia has had it's called a
gas reservation policy, which is a hell of a big
way to say we're going to keep some gas here
in Australia and export it all up to Asia. We're

(00:21):
almost all to Asia. And the federal government has now
set to follow the lead set by Western Australia probably
nearly twenty years ago. Let's how long this goes back. Heather,
knowing at federal level, had the foresight to think that's
not a bad idea. And so what we've seen here
gas is the only transition fuel available to wean industries

(00:41):
off coal fired power and onto renewables. We've discussed coal
fired power before. All the assets are running out of life.
The biggest one in Australia has been propped up to
the tune of for said two hundred million dollars. Tax
players are paying that in New South Wales to keep
this old, this old bm off still chugging along for

(01:01):
the next two years. But coal is on the way
out now gas is the only transition fuel. As I said,
the opposition took a similar policy to the last election
that labor was criticizing it. Oh, it's terrible, it's terrible.
Now apparent it's a great idea. Gas prices have tripled
here in the last decade as coal fired plants get
a lot older. And guess what is being exported. The

(01:22):
whole line of is exported. So now the government is
saying we're not in so many words yet this has
just been a story floated in the media today. But
governments are propping up industries without money, industries like steel
and aluminium, to keep jobs in the remote areas. Keep
some industry at home. What's upon And don't we make cars?
You're not anymore? And politically, of course, the opposition's bashing

(01:44):
labor over high prices. Election promises are going to cut costs,
the need to safeguard jobs. It's a mess. But the
line of the short of it looks to be that
the gas exporting companies are going to be told you
must keep fifteen twenty twenty five percent of the gas
you're getting out of the ground, must keep that for
the domestic market here in Australia and if you don't
bek it to Belcher. So we just have to wait

(02:05):
and see which way to mop flops on this, but
we expect to announcement next week. Very interesting now, the
black market tobacco is becoming quite a problem with you
people own absolutely. Here's some stats three of sales of
legal tobacco that's the stuff that you know we're allowed
to buy, that's collapsed. Almost thirty percent collapse in the

(02:25):
last year to September, one third the size it was
three years ago. Now, if you spend fifty bucks in
a packet of cigarettes over here, twenty cigarettes, about thirty
five forty dollars of it is actually tax that goes
to the government. Here's the thing. Ever, on the black market,
a packet of durries can be bought for ten or
twelve dollars. So the government tax takes down dramatically seven

(02:49):
billion this year. It was more than double that just
five years ago. And the other metric relates to health
today and I hadn't even thought of this. The tax
was devised to call in the governments back in the
day to discourage smoking. Let's tax this product to make
it every more expensive. Well, here's the thing. The sales
legal tobacco are dramatically down. Black market souse with the

(03:10):
roof state governments are saying, listen, coming up, government, cut
the exercise. We'll get rid of the criminals. They're all
shooting each other and fire bombing each other's shops. I
don't think anyone's died yet, but it's only a question
of time, because that must must have you. Have you
stopped to think about how nutty this is. They are
fire bombing shots shops over illegal tobacco, for God's sake.

(03:32):
I know that's nuts, right, it really is. Yeah, most listen,
thanks very much. Bring us up to speed on that.
You have yourself a nice day. That's Murray Old's Australia correspondent.
For more from Hither Duplessy Alan Drive, listen live to
news Talks it'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.