Seizures of counterfeit alcohol increase fivefold in two years as criminals target lucrative market
- Seizures of fake electronics and luxury goods fall as gangs tap into valuable alcohol market
By
Chris Parsons
Last updated at 8:19 AM on 3rd February 2012
Seizures of fake alcohol by trading standards have rocketed by five times in two years, according to new research.
New findings have revealed how gangs are exploiting the rising demand for cheap alcohol by tapping into counterfeit booze.
Research by The Institute of Engineering and Technology has fueled concern that local authorities may be focusing too much on alcohol seizures rather than those of other counterfeit goods such as electronics.
Experts say the increase in seizures of fake alcohol is down to the increasingly lucrative counterfeit booze market
The results, published in Engineering and Technology magazine, found that alcohol seizures increased fivefold from 31 in 2009 to 148 in 2011, while tobacco seizures increased by three times over two years.
Conversely, occasions where consumer electronics were seized fell to 61 from 84 in 2010 and 111 in 2009, a drop of 55 per cent in two years.
Fake branded clothing and luxury goods suffered even more in the same period, with seizures down by almost two-thirds.
A spokesperson for the Trading Standards Institute (TSI) told Engineering and Technology magazine: ‘In the last six months, we have noted a significant increase in high-profile seizures of counterfeit alcohol by trading standards authorities.’
ALARMING GROWTH OF THE ILLEGAL ALCOHOL TRADE
Drinkers have been warned to watch out for the dangerous counterfeit alcohol with the illegal trade growing rapidly across Britain.
In July, five men who were illegally distilling vodka at an industrial estate in Boston, Lincolnshire, were killed in an explosion.
One of the biggest illegal vodka scams was discovered at a Hackney factory in 2010. Polish workers at the rat-infested warehouse churned out 24 bottles per minute, cheating the public purse of £16m in duty and VAT.
A consignment of £430,000 worth of pure alcohol, disguised as car wash fluid, was seized in Dublin on its way to Britain in 2009.
Two years earlier, a massive distillery run by Polish workers at Cardiff docks was discovered. The 5,500 litres of ‘vodka’ found there contained dangerous levels of methylated spirits and industrial variants of alcohol.
In 2002, a woman celebrating her engagement died after drinking vodka sold to her by a local man in her hometown of Musselburgh, along the Firth of Forth.
And just last week, 21-year-old Sheffield University student Lauren Platts (above) was left with damaged sight after being sold a £5.99 bottle of industrial alcohol masquerading as vodka.
Kris Sangani, consumer technology editor at ET magazine, who led the investigation, told The Guardian: ‘Most of the evidence points to a policy change by trading standards authorities to target alcohol and tobacco rather than any decrease in illegal activity in other categories such as counterfeit electronics.’
Director general of the Anti-Counterfeiting Group, Ruth Orchard, said the Trading Standards focus away from electronics and luxury goods was a ‘policy change’ rather than a response to falling numbers.
She said: ‘This focus has been imposed from above. The problem is that trading standards authorities have no powers of arrest. We support them as much as we can, but they require more resources and support.’
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an estimated 50% of all tobacco bought in the UK is now illegal, smuggled and highly toxic. People buy it because it’s 50% cheaper than the much less damaging legal tobacco. So half of all the revenue goes to criminal gangs, lost from the govt. The health consequences are expected to be collosal. People are cash strapped, they will keep buying it. If the taxes remain high so will the demand, alcohol could, it seems, go the same way if minimum pricing comes into being. Stupid pc politicians playing nanny to the press are public will have disasterous effects. Bring down the taxes, we have little enough left to be happy about.
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DON’T GET PARALYZED! Why drink cheap hooch and rot your innards with the creosote and carbolic acid now used to adulterate it, when you can get pure old sweet-mash corn that won’t hurt an infant? This is good fresh corn liquor for your enjoyment that is brand new liquor fresh the day you get it. Your grandfather used it and lived to be 90 – your preacher keeps a little for medicine – bottle-raised babies are fattened on it – it’s mellow and soothing to the spirit and makes you love your neighbors – take a little for your stomach’s sake and thine many infirmities. Special week-end price of $ 8.00 per gallon – guaranteed not to contain lye, wood alcohol or manure. Special discounts to liquor heads, baptists and others who use larger quantities.
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DON’T GET PARALYZED! Why drink cheap hooch and rot your innards with the creosote and carbolic acid now used to adulterate it, when you can get pure old sweet-mash corn that won’t hurt an infant? This is good fresh corn liquor for your enjoyment that is brand new liquor fresh the day you get it. Your grandfather used it and lived to be 90 – your preacher keeps a little for medicine – bottle-raised babies are fattened on it – it’s mellow and soothing to the spirit and makes you love your neighbors – take a little for your stomach’s sake and thine many infirmities. Special week-end price of $ 8.00 per gallon – guaranteed not to contain lye, wood alcohol or manure. Special discounts to liquor heads, baptists and others who use larger quantities.
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Blair’s vision for a multi-cultural Britain – get over it…
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It’s up to the individual to put stop to these rackets. If someone offers you something cheap, be it a car stereo in a pub, or cheap booze from the back of a van, you know it’s either stolen or counterfeit. Whilst there are buyers the trade will go on.
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It’s up to the individual to put stop to these rackets. If someone offers you something cheap, be it a car stereo in a pub, or cheap booze from the back of a van, you know it’s either stolen or counterfeit. Whilst there are buyers the trade will go on.
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Government only understand how to tax and are not particularly bothered about its consequences on the plebs, just “freindly fire” if they end up on a slab and justification for making government greed look like moral concern!
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This is what happens when the government increase the cost of alcohol. It only affects the poor.
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I wonder if the level of taxation has anything to do with it, no-brainer really, minimum alchohol pricing will feed this, and as ususal the people it is supposed to help will be most at risk.
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These shops buy what they know to be fake alcohol and tobacco but how many of them lose their licence to sell it? Not many. We have had shops raided here and the items seized but they are still trading, still selling counterfeit goods. The only way to combat it is to close them down.
– Angela, I think I still live in England but some days I am not so sure, 03/2/2012 15:25
Very few Angela from what happens round here. All they get is a slap on the wrist and allowed to keep trading. Although on the odd occasion a licence is lost, you find that a ‘family’ member takes over the business!!!!!!
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