Mr. Tony Hickey:

The bottom line is that a successful strategy to combat the growth of the black market and retail crime in Ireland must comprise implementation of overlapping measures, including robust enforcement, legislation, where necessary and enhanced court fines and penalties. The investment in tackling the black market should be benchmarked proportionally against the revenue being lost to the State. Every additional €1 million invested in resources to tackle the black market will result in savings to the State of €2 million to €3 million, a reduction in direct Exchequer losses, money that will provide surplus savings that are quantifiable and a reduction in an essential source of revenue for subversive gangland criminals and, on the face of it, value for money.

Another specific policy proposal of how to apply these resources, as covered already by Retail Ireland, is that of whistleblowing. This country has a chequered history in terms of informants and information. However, as instanced in the not too distant past people will give information if they are paid to do so. As well as these specific measures, politicians must be vigilant of the unintended consequences of well-intentioned public policy measures such as excise duty increases and so on. Finally, our legislators should reflect on the use of resources. When one looks at the statistics in regard to the number of inspections carried out of newsagents, smoke free zones and so on by and large compliance is high. I learned a great deal about budgets in a previous role. However, that was at a time when we had more money. Budgets and money are always difficult issues. Resources must be deployed where crime levels are higher. It is illogical that there is so much effort being put into policing smoke free zones and newsagents as opposed to the traffickers and smugglers.

Without labouring the point, I served in the Garda Síochána at a time when more than 600 people were killed on the roads in this country. Through education, law enforcement, legislation and penalty points, there has been a dramatic reduction in the number of people killed on our roads, although even one death is one too many. The deployment of additional resources to tackle the illegal cigarette market and diesel trade would be self financing and, probably, profitable through a reduction of sales which avoid taxation and would be proportionate in terms of balancing public health objectives and reducing crime.