The federal government has introduced a new bill to parliament intended to make it easier to prosecute people involved in the illicit tobacco trade.

If passed, the changes to the Customs Act mean prosecutors will no longer need to prove an accused person knew the tobacco they were handling had been smuggled.

Instead, authorities will be able to point to the characteristics of the product itself – an implausibly low price, non-compliant packaging, concealment – to establish that it entered the country unlawfully.

The bill also expands powers to obtain documents and confiscate the proceeds of crime.

It’s the second Commonwealth bill cracking down on illicit tobacco this year. In March, the Combating Illicit Tobacco Bill increased maximum penalties and gave law enforcement the right to use wiretaps when investigating tobacco offences.

States have similarly expanded enforcement and penalties, introducing store closure powers, multi-million dollar fines and lengthy prison sentences.

There’s an emerging pattern. With few signs the sale of illegal tobacco products is being curtailed, each round of punitive laws seems to produce more rounds of even more punitive laws. It’s an escalating spiral of legislation, but with little improvement to show for it.

Read more: Three things Australia must do to end the tobacco wars

The scale of the problem

On a superficial level, further expanding police powers and penalties appears to make sense.

Following the imposition of the world’s highest tobacco taxes, and the prohibition of vapes and other less harmful nicotine products, criminals have launched a hostile takeover of the nation’s nicotine trade.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics recently........

© The Conversation