It would be an understatement to describe as pathetic the ACT government's response to this newspaper's revelations that dozens of shops across the ACT are flogging illegally imported cigarettes to customers - many of whom are under the legal smoking age - with no fear of detection, let alone prosecution.

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If Chief Minister Andrew Barr and the members of his government believe the public can be fobbed off with the bland reassurance that "Access Canberra is working with ACT Policing and other government agencies coordinating a holistic response to illicit tobacco and vaping products in the ACT", they are sorely mistaken.

Few news stories broken by this masthead in recent times have generated as much interest as this week's report on just how easy it was to purchase illegal cigarettes, virtually over the counter, for a fraction of the cost of their legal equivalents.

While the problem of illegal tobacco sales is neither new nor entirely the fault of the ACT government, it is responsible for ensuring that only legally imported cigarettes, on which the appropriate excise duty has been levied, are sold in its jurisdiction.

It also has a duty, given the grave health risks associated with long-term tobacco use, to ensure that minors are not allowed to buy cigarettes from unscrupulous operators - who may have links to organised crime - who have discovered there is easy money to be made from nicotine.

It is obvious from both the scale of the problem and the government's limp response to........

© Canberra Times