Select Committee on Public Accounts Minutes of Evidence

APPENDIX 1

Supplementary memorandum submitted by HM Customs and Excise

Question 110: Perhaps you would let me have a note on the number of people you have prosecuted?

Year	No.of cases	No. of defendants	No. of convictions	% of cases with convictions
2000-01	713	1,350	609	85.41
1999-2000	858	1,347	791	92.19
1998-99	704	1,032	623	88.49
1997-98	518	730	446	86.10

Question 124: Could you supply to the Committee a note of the figures for the different kinds of entry for as many years going back as you can, 1995, however far back you can go, right up to present point, if that is possible?

Billion sticks estimated to have been successfully smuggled	1996-97	1997-98	1998-99	1999-2000	2000-01
Cross Channel smuggling—by passengers and in HGV cabs	1.1	1.4	1.9	2.4	2.5
Freight and other smuggling—containers, RORO, air	2.4	4.2	6.7	11.5	14.0
Total cigarette smuggling	3.5	5.6	8.6	13.9	16.5

Question 240: We note that time after time your manpower has been cut and you have been starved of manpower. That is a fact, is it not?

Year (figures at 1 April)	Number of staff
1990	27,274
1991	27,762
1992	26,783
1993	25,886
1994	25,428
1995	24,699
1996	23,663
1997	23,693
1998	23,715
1999	23,523
2000	23,050
2001	23,120
2002	22,285 (estimated outturn)

Question 278: Do we have any [smuggling] figures in relation to tobacco smuggling from Eire [and other regions] or is it not a big issue?

Cigarettes seized by region	1998-99	1999-2000	2000-01
Northern Ireland	32m	22m	51m
London	—	43m*	127m
South	—	857m*	899m
Central	—	578m*	509m
North	—	210m*	320m
Total cigarettes seized (including UK bound overseas seizures)	560m	1,888m	2,770m

  * Estimates—Collections were re-organised twice between 1998 and 2000 and have since been re-organised into the four regions noted. Regions do not match old collection boundaries.

HM Customs and Excise

July 2002

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Prepared 10 January 2003