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ASH Daily News
20 November 2001

Headlines

£1m of duty free stolen from customs warehouse every week
EU Commissioner says UK tobacco and drink tax too high
UK’s biggest cigarette haul

Full Text

£1m of duty free stolen from customs warehouse every week

Criminal gangs have infiltrated customs and excise on such a scale that they are stealing duty free spirits and wine worth £1m a week from a single warehouse, MPs have been told.

Richard Broadbent, the head of customs and excise, told MPs that criminals had infiltrated both customs staff and companies handling duty free alcohol and tobacco so that goods held in warehouses for export can be diverted to the home market.

The worst case is a warehouse in London holding Whisky, wine and tobacco bound for the export market which lost £340m of duty free stock over seven years.

Earlier in the week Mr Broadbent faced a grilling from the Commons Treasury sub-committee for the failure of his department to get a grip on the extent of internal fraud and the amount of smuggling into Britain.

But Mr Broadbent responded to criticisms by telling David Ruffley, MP for Bury St Edmunds, that the huge losses from its warehouses were regarded as “operational matters which were not the business of politicians.” Mr Ruffley had criticised the failure to tell ministers of the scale of the problem.

The scale of the fraud will lead to vetting procedures for staff working in the 1,094 customs warehouses and firms using their facilities when Gordon Brown, the chancellor, announces targets to reduce tobacco and alcohol tax evasion this month.

Source: The Guardian, 19 November 2001



EU Commissioner says UK tobacco and drink tax too high

On a visit to Downing Street, Frits Bolkestein, the EU internal market commissioner, branded UK taxes on alcohol and tobacco as the highest in Europe and used the opportunity to call for greater tax harmonisation between EU countries.

“Excise taxes in this country are very high – they are the highest in the European Union,” said Mr Bolkestein, adding, “A quarter of all cigarettes in this country are smuggled – a loss of £4.5 billion to the UK Treasury, so there is an advantage to some degree of harmonisation.” He claimed that the root cause of the tobacco smuggling was linked to UK tax policy

Mr Bolkestein went on to comment on concern from his officials that customs officers in the UK were being too “heavy handed” on suspected smugglers by impounding their cars. He called on the Government to stop the practice of impounding cars of people who exceed the recommended guidelines of personal allowance on tobacco and alcohol.

But a spokesman from the Chancellor’s office said: “We make no apology fro cracking down on smuggling. This is not about stopping people bringing in tobacco or alcohol for their own use. We are battling organised criminal gangs who cost the government billions of pounds in lost revenue.”

There was an even blunter rejection of Mr Bolkestein’s call for Britain to bring its excise duties into line with the rest of the EU, “We have made clear we are in favour of tax competition, not tax harmonisation,” said the spokesman.

The EU commissioner had also handed Mr Blair a Gallup survey of 4,000 companies from across the 15 EU states showing that complex regulations put Britain bottom of the league of European countries where it is easy to trade.

The Confederation of British Industry called the results of the survey “a wake up call to all public policy makers of the dangers of over regulation,” although a spokesman added that things may not be as bad as the survey suggested.

Source: The Times, The Daily Mail, 20 November 2001


UK’s biggest cigarette haul

Customs in Northern Ireland have seized the UK’s biggest ever single consignment of smuggled cigarettes.

Over 42 million cigarettes were discovered after investigators detained a cargo vessel at Warrenpoint, Northern Ireland, en route from Latvia. The record haul follows a similar investigation the previous day, during which officers found 20 million cigarettes on a boat in the Northern Ireland port of Dundalk.

However, officials are keen to play down speculation in the media that these consignments may have been organised by the paramilitary group, the Real IRA.

Commenting on the seizures, Customs minister Paul Boateng said: “Tobacco smuggling on this scale is not a victimless crime. It draws people into links with organised crime, attacks the livelihood of honest traders and in particular makes cigarettes cheaper and more accessible to children.”

Source: Off Licence News, 16 November 2001



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