Q72 Mr. Dave Anderson: The last discussion has reflected what we have heard for at least the last three years on this Committee, that thankfully there is very, very good co-operation across the border with virtually all the agencies, yet it is also three years since we first heard about the real issues of fuel laundering. Yesterday in the Grand Committee colleagues from Northern Ireland were saying as far as they can see there has been hardly any improvement in the situation regarding fuel, and in fact raised other issues about pollution as well as other issues which are becoming more and more noticeable. You set up the Fuel Fraud Enforcement Group in July, (a) can you tell us why that was seen as being necessary and (b) whether it produced any increases in results?

Mr Whiting: The driver was very much the murder of Paul Quinn and the political interest which showed that there was a connection between paramilitaries who were involved in fuel fraud in South Armagh and the perception, media, political and public, that PIRA were still operating and controlling fuel fraud in South Armagh. I would applaud Paul Goggins for his response because I think he said, "You are doing a good job but it would be fair to say you can do more and you can do it better". We saw that a collaborative approach, a multi-agency cross-border approach, could produce more results. Also, we have not done ourselves justice in telling the story of what we have achieved. The achievements of all the agencies in Northern Ireland and, indeed, the Republic of Ireland are much greater than the simple bare results achieved by HMRC and Customs & Excise before us. I suppose that was the driver for starting to do something. What have we achieved? We have had two meetings. We have set out an action plan which has short-term, medium-term and long-term objectives. We have already made some progress in respect of each of those objectives. If you would like me to put some meat on the bones I am happy to do that. For example, we have agreed a single target that we will work together against as our first testing ground to conduct a joint operation. We have already in mind additional targets, suspects, that we would like to work against together in the future. We have looked at our media strategy and I think those of you who live in Northern Ireland will probably have seen that we have been very much more proactive in telling the public what HMRC and our partner agencies have been involved in in terms of fuel fraud. Part of that is actually telling the story that there is a problem with laundered fuel, and this was where you started from. The fact of the matter is that HMRC introduced the Registered Deals in Controlled Oil Scheme some years ago and that has been very successful in Northern Ireland in squeezing the market in respect of red diesel.

Q73 Chairman: Would your task be made easier if fuel laundering were made a separate offence because the Government has been publicly toying with this idea for some time and the Committee was minded to think it was a good thing to do? What is your view?

Mr Lawrence: I will answer that question but, if I may, I would just like to come back on Mr Anderson’s question. One of my specific roles is to look at the way that our strategic approaches to the investigation of organised crime work, how effective they are. Two or three years ago when Criminal Investigation in Belfast began to tell me that they had a problem with crime around oils, the problem was not that they did not know it was there or were not investigating it, the problem was that nationally it was not a particular priority for us. The step that I took to change that was to persuade the senior levels of Criminal Investigation that we should devote more resources and a greater priority to dealing with oils offences in Northern Ireland. The results we have seen more recently, for example the television coverage in the operation Mr Whiting mentioned and one we might mention to you in private a little later, show that we have put more effort into the investigation of oils offences and we are getting more results out of it. Turning to your question, Chairman, you are quite right that we have looked very long and hard at the idea of whether there should be a specific offence of oils laundering and we have been looking at that in the context of the legislation in the Republic which provides a model offence along those lines. We have two issues. The first is that we are not yet convinced that offence would actually give us better tools to attack oil offences than we currently have. We are getting results using the offences that are presently on the statute book. Secondly, our colleagues in the South tell us that they do not use their specific oil laundering offence. In the face of those two pieces of evidence, at the moment we are reluctant to take this forward. What we would end up with is an offence on the statute book which would not actually add anything effective to the armoury we already have. If that proves to be wrong and that would give us something extra over and above what we can attack at the moment then, of course, we will look at this again, but at the moment we are still looking at that and thinking probably not.

Chairman: I see. Thank you.

Q74 Mr. Dave Anderson: Mr Whiting mentioned that you do a good job and we need to see the evidence of that. We have got figures showing that convictions are in single figures. For 2006 there were six convictions, four in 2007 and none in 2005. I suppose you have improved slightly. In the discussion s yesterday in the Grand Committee people were saying that when vehicles are seized people go out and buy another one and they are back the same day. Either you cannot catch them or if you do catch them you are not dissuading them from taking it up again, so either it is not working because they are not going to jail or it is worth them carrying on doing it because they can make money without the risk. Is it seen as being a risk worth taking by these people? It must be.

Mrs Smith: I think it is fair to say that is the case, but added to our armoury in the kinds of things we can do there are Serious Crime Prevention Orders. Although you may not get a conviction you might be able to apply for that which will help to disrupt the crime. I am sure Mr Whiting can add a few things to that.

Mr Whiting: We have not got a lot of figures with us today, but we could send them to you.

Q75 Mr. Dave Anderson: It would help if you could give them to us.

Mr Whiting: I appreciate the figures will be right, I do not dispute them. I would like to say we have increased our activity in the recent past. It will take some time because some of our cases ---

Q76 Mr Hepburn: How many people have actually gone to prison?

Mr Whiting: None.

Q77 Mr. Dave Anderson: None since the new regime, but it is only three or four months old.

Mr Whiting: None for a long time, that is correct, and that is a different issue. We have increased our activity and if you deal with the number of people we have arrested in respect of fuel fraud, that number has increased dramatically.

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.

The full transcript may be read here.

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