LAST week's seizure of about £250,000 worth of smuggled cigarettes is the only glimpse the public has had of a murky racket of which nobody knows the scale. The most visible sign so far is the small time trading observed by any pedestrian in Henry Street, Mary Street and North Earl Street in the city centre.
Mr Ed McDonald of the Henry Street Mary Street Partnership estimates that at any one time there are between 20 and 33 sellers actively hawking cigarettes on which duty has not been paid. It is illegal to sell cigarettes to a person under 16. Some of those selling cigarettes are under 16.
There are two main sources of illegal cigarettes. There are the enthusiastic amateurs who travel, mainly to Spain and the Canaries, fill their suitcases with cheap cigarettes and sell them on the Dublin streets. A carton of 200 can cost as little as £6 in countries like Spain or Luxembourg (which have low rates of duty on tobacco) while it will retail here for £28. "Plenty of scope there for profit," say the Revenue Commissioners.
The bulk of the illegal trade comes in container loads off ferries. The trade is believed to be controlled by a Dublin based criminal who is one of the suspects in the investigation into the murder of journalist, Veronica Guerin.
He pays cash for a consignment of cigarettes and other tobacco products from warehouses in the free port area around Schipol Airport in Amsterdam. There were 800,000 cigarettes found in the lorry seized last week in the industrial estate in west Dublin considerably more than could be carried in a suitcase.
The Irish Tobacco Manufacturers Advisory Committee (ITMAC) estimates that the illegal trade is probably worth in excess of £20 million. Revenue sources, however, say this figure is on the high side. Mr Michael Campbell of RGDATA accepts the £20 million estimate. "We know how much sales are down at the cash and carries."
A spokesman for ITMAC concedes that it is difficult to be certain but they are standing over the £20 million figure "or possibly more". The biggest loser of all is not the manufacturers or the retail trade, the spokesman says, but the Exchequer. "The Minister for Finance takes 76 per cent of the cost of every packet of cigarettes." If the £20 million figure is correct, the Exchequer is losing £15 million per annum.
THERE is a lively trade also in roll your own tobacco products. These are sold principally from the back of vans in the poorer Dublin suburbs. The ITMAC spokesman says this gives them another guide to the scale of the illegal trade. "The sale of roll your own paper greatly exceeds the sale of tax paid roll your own tobacco.
Mr Campbell says his members are extremely frustrated that the illegal trading in cigarettes is happening under the noses of gardai on the city centre streets. "If they make an arrest, they know they have no place to put them," Mr Campbell claims.
Chief Supt Dick Kelly, of Fitzgibbon Street Garda station, denies this. We have been active on those streets for the past two years and have charged under the Public Order Act and the Casual Trading Act. We are enforcing the law and we are seizing illegal cigarettes."
On Wednesday of this week, for example, they seized 29,400 illegal cigarettes in houses and 2,000 on the streets. In 1995, they seized 320,000 cigarettes on the streets.
Co-operation with Customs and Excise investigators is close, according to Chief Supt Kelly. "We meet once a week and we would have daily dealings with them." There is none of the inter-service rivalry which has sometimes been alleged in their joint effort against the drug barons, Chief Supt Kelly said.
A spokeswoman for the Revenue Commissioners said the key to tackling the problem is good intelligence. "The days of the chance find are over." This intelligence is gleaned through co-operation with other revenue authorities and with the Garda.
From September of last year, the excise duty on cigarettes became payable by buying tax stamps issued by the Revenue Commissioners. Anyone manufacturing or importing cigarettes for sale in the State is obliged to apply them to the cigarette packs. This helps to identify smuggled cigarettes. The spokeswoman said there are 13 cases down for hearing against people who offered unstamped cigarettes for sale. There is a £1,000 fine on conviction for each offence.
MR McDonald says there are few tobacconists in the area but the real problem is the sense of "nervousness" blatantly illegal trading causes. Women shoppers are afraid to walk down the side of the streets they are operating on.
Mr McDonald believes there should be more plain clothes gardai on the streets. The sellers have a bush telegraph that goes on alert when uniformed gardai arrive. "The gardai need more resources," Mr McDonald says. Some guards who were on the beat here have been transferred to the B order because of the BSE scare.
The sale of illegal cigarettes creates an image problem for the three Dublin streets. It is clear, however, that the trade will continue at its present level unless the Garda and the Customs make more seizures like last week's £50,000 haul.
