Record haul sees smuggled tobacco seizures surge 70%

CUSTOMS officers seized €95.8 million worth of smuggled tobacco last year – up almost 70% on 2008, it emerged last night.

The bulk of the massive rise was down to Europe’s largest-ever seizure of cigarettes in October – more than 120 million valued at €50m – from a vessel docked at Greenore Port in Co Louth.

The record haul involved 80,000 Palace and Chelsea cigarettes stuffed into 1,489 animal feed bags in a vessel that sailed to Ireland from the Philippines.

Preliminary figures from the Revenue Commissioners for last year also reveal 96,532 litres of bootleg alcohol was found smuggled into the country.

Custom officers also recovered €30.2m worth of cannabis, €2.3m of cocaine and heroin, as well as €6.3m of amphetamines, ecstasy and other drugs.

The total tax take for the country was down €7bn on last year, from €40.78bn to €33.04bn.

More than €2.6bn was recovered from tax dodgers by the Revenue’s Special Investigations squad since it was set up nine years ago. The bulk of the money in 2009 – €55.3m – was retrieved from people failing to declare interest payments from their banks.

Some €7.7m was found stashed in bogus non-resident accounts, €18.3m in offshore assets, and €12.05m in life assurance products.

Revenue officials also took €1.35m in cash from suspected criminals. The figures also revealed €5.31m in fines were handed down to criminals for a range of offences including laundering oil and dodging vehicle tax.