Q336 Mr. Dave Anderson: We have heard from a number of people at the sharp end of this in terms of the people you represent and they have said that despite the increase in numbers in terms of officers and setting up the various bodies to deliver, the effect of all this put together has not been very positive. It has been said that the increase in fuel paid for legitimately could be explained by higher vehicle usage but also they believe Revenue and Customs have only scraped the surface. There is a lot of crime going on. There is a lot of resource and the business of feeding through information to yourselves they do not believe it is being acted on. Can you comment on that?

Mr Gerrard: The revenue loss figure that I gave you, the £245 million, as a proportion of the shared market takes into account increased vehicle usage. The overall amount of fuel used in Northern Ireland that is not UK duty paid - shop and laundered - has dropped from over 40% to under 30% so I would dispute that. In fact I have had letters over the past few years from petrol retailers complaining about something we have done but also saying they have seen their products increase. That is the first point. I think the second point is that I certainly do not think there is a lack of will on our behalf. We have devoted significant volumes of resource for a significant period to do this and we are very determined to continue to make that impact. In terms of the information we have seen over the last three years the volume of information that comes into our Customs Confidential Hotline (which is, if I can give it a little plug, 0800 595000) increase in Northern Ireland in relation to oils, but it is still at relatively small levels and I think one of the things that we need to do with our joint forum is to look at ways to get more information from them. We have a very sophisticated intelligence set up and we take a lot of information from that, but they are on the ground at the sharp end and they can get the information and I think sometimes that does not always get through to us.

Mr Toon: In terms of the core criminality there are two aspects to this. One is the way in which we are actually working very closely with PSNI, that we are involved on a very regular basis - weekly, if not multiple weekly basis - in dealing with detections which are made of illicit fuel as it is being transported, moving then to seizure and then taking enforcement action. That is happening very, very often. In terms of the more sophisticated criminality, the more organised criminality, I think that we are beginning to see that it is feeding through in terms of the kind of figures that Paul was talking about. We are being able to put out of business in Northern Ireland and elsewhere some significant players who have been involved in oils fraud and oils laundering for quite an extended period of time. These are people who are operating in the South Armagh cross-border area. We are working very regularly again with PSNI. We are working regularly with the Assets Recovery Agency and with CAB and the Revenue Commissioners in the South. We were involved obviously in the operation which got quite a lot of publicity ten days or so ago in relation to Mr Thomas Murphy. There is a lot of that sort of work being done. We are dealing with some very sophisticated, very long term criminality and that takes time and a lot of effort. I do not think that the will or the effort is lacking either in our agency or indeed any of the others to tackle that problem. Could we do more with our resources? The simple answer of course is yes because any organisation can always do more if it has more, but we, as all organisations, are limited to the amount of resource available but also limited in relation to the information that is available to us to act on. As Paul says, there is a limited pool of information that is coming to us from the legitimate trade and from elsewhere.

Q337 Mr. Dave Anderson: Another suggestion was that the security forces are not working as well with you as the retailers would like them to and perhaps you could do with more officers on the ground. I think you have probably answered the second part; what about the first part?

Mr Toon: I would think that quite categorically our operational relationship with the PSNI is better now than it has been in a very long time. The level of co-operation is very high; we work very closely on joint activity both in terms of targeted investigations and in terms of a reaction to low level fraud. I find it difficult to see how much more co-operation we could receive from agencies like the PSNI. We also work closely with the Assets Recovery Agency; that is a growing relationship. Only a few days ago you saw the Assets Recovery Agency take action in the High Courts on Malachy Maloy where there was a £1.4 million restraint. That was a referral from Revenue and Customs. That is direct, effective operational co-operation where we cannot take an enforcement action because of availability of evidence but the Assets Recovery Agency is able to have an impact. That is real co-operation.

This is an uncorrected transcript of evidence taken in public and reported to the House. The transcript has been placed on the internet on the authority of the Committee. Neither witnesses nor Members have had the opportunity to correct the record. The transcript is not yet an approved formal record of these proceedings.

Promoted by Paul Foy on behalf of Dave Anderson, both of St Cuthbert's Church Hall, Shibdon Road, Blaydon, NE21 5PT