What to do about illegal cigarette sales
Economic crimes need economic answers
The BBC had an excellent expose of shops selling illegal cigarettes in Hull. Reporters tried to buy illegal cigarettes in 12 shops, and were successful 9 times. That is a high hit rate - and it is not as if they are known local smokers. It is clear that retailers think selling illegal cigarettes reasonably openly is a safe bet.
They appear right to think that. The BBC reported the case of one shop that was prosecuted recently. The owner was fined £80, plus costs and a £34 victim surcharge. They don’t report the amount of the costs, but I doubt they were large. No wonder the same shop was selling illegal cigarettes again within a few hours - doing so is very profitable.
Even the new fines - which can be “up to £10,000” don’t seem very large, when the hauls of illegal cigarettes are worth £20,000.
Economic crimes, unlike crimes of passion, can be deterred. We will get less of this sort of crime if the chance of being caught, multiplied by the consequences, exceed the expected proceeds of crime. It really is that simple.
I don’t want to propose prison sentences - prisons are expensive, we don’t have enough spaces, and the last thing I want is to introduce criminals to other criminals.
I have already proposed that we should use a range of sanctions, such as using tags to enforce a draconian prison-at-home regime. Those might well be applicable here. In this case however, I have two specific additional policy ideas. Well, new policy ideas is this blog's rationale.
First, the charge for court costs should actually cover the costs. That would include police time, as well as court time. The criminal has inflicted this cost, and they can pay for it. The cost might well run into the tens of thousands of pounds. If they don’t pay, we will seize stock from their shop - repeatedly, if necessary, until the value pays off the debt.
Second, we should shut the shop. First offence, shut the shop for a day. At some point in the month after the person is found guilty, the police will turn up, walk into the shop, and announce that it is shut immediately. Staff and customers will be escorted off the premises, and the police will padlock all doors - front and back. A day later the shopkeeper can go to the police station and buy the padlock - and cover the cost of fitting it. In exchange for the payment, they will be given the key, and they can reopen the shop. Combined with a more realistic police and court charge that might be sufficient.
If they do it again the police will shut the shop for a week instead of a day. They will shut the shop for a week the third time as well, except that this time they will turn the electricity off as well. All the food in the fridges and freezers will rot, and the shopkeeper will have to sort it out before they can reopen.
If we find that a day never deters, but a week does, we can move straight to a week. If we find that turning the electricity off is the best deterrent, we can do that immediately as well. Test and learn, as we now call trial and error, is a wonderful thing.
The same approach will be applied to pubs and barbers, both of which the BBC report to be frequent sellers of illegal cigarettes.
Nothing will get rid of all illegal sales except ending smoking in the UK. Thankfully, as long-time readers will know, I have a plan for that as well.
But in the meantime this will reduce the problem substantially, cut smoking rates, improve health, and increase tax revenues because smokers will buy legal cigarettes more often.
Excellent, as ever.
Your electricity suggestion got me thinking about how we would actually do that. If they don't have a smart meter, it is actually rather hard to cut someone off. So perhaps that can be part of the package - compulsory smart meter installation :)
More seriously, I was thinking yesterday, as I sailed along the North Essex coast, how very hard it is to actually control what lands on our coastline. I suspect leisure boats can come in and out largely undetected. This was emphasised in the case of "Nick", the ex-marine turned people smuggler - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c70664266plo - "Border Force is responsible for securing the 11,000 miles of UK coastline, but the security of harbours and marinas rests with private operators, Charlie Eastaugh, the force's director of maritime, told the BBC."
Trading Standards, who are in charge of local enforcement, I am told, has been largely decimated since they have become entirely dependent on local authorities. (At the time of the abolishing of the OFT, I think).