A GROUP of covert operatives confronting the illicit cigarette trade has visited Basingstoke – and found some startling results. The Gazette joined the crack squad . . .

Headed by former Scotland Yard DCI Detective Chief Inspector Will O’Reilly, a team commissioned by American tobacco giants Philip Morris International last week targeted shops, traders and online forums operating in the town dealing cigarettes illegally.

As a smoker, I understand the deep-rooted frustrations many have with rocketing taxes on smoking products and am always enticed by the prospect of heading abroad on my holidays, to return with 500g of my preferred tobacco – ensuring that for a couple of months, at least, my bank balance and habit will see eye-to-eye.

Yet for every innocent tourist smoker, there are those who take the process up a level to profiteer from it. And this is where Will and his team come in. 

Many believe when they purchase cheap fags and baccy, they are doing so to save, in some instances, more than half of the product’s UK value. But ultimately there is more to it than that.

Cigarettes cut with a plethora of unsavoury substances unfit for human consumption (Will recalls testing once revealed “human faeces” being placed within a cigarette) often find their way on to shelves in our town, and the team were determined to show me this.

I was invited to join Will and his team for an afternoon’s undercover work.

The team’s experience is vast. Some former security guards, some former undercover officers with the force. It’s a group you want on your side.

The group targets five marks in the area. Independent sellers, who have purchased the tobacco from Eastern Europe to be sold on for profit, street vendors dishing out smoking gear from spots inside the town centre and pubs and shops selling them behind counters. It’s alarming to understand how rife this is in our town.

“This is nothing,” Will explains.

“Basingstoke is a town which is quite modern and focused around the town centre, so you don’t really get many shops selling it like we do in places like Leeds and Manchester. Here the market is online, in different forums with various people from across Europe.

“We are here to make sure the awareness is raised of the horrors of what illicit cigarettes can do, but also urging people to inform the authorities if they hear about this. It could make a real difference.”

In a recent government report by HM Revenue and Customs, it has stated that more than £2 billion in lost revenue is caused by tobacco smuggling. 

The practise of selling cigarettes laced with more toxins than your average cigarette illegally not only damages health, but it is crippling the local off license market.

There are three types of illicit cigarettes. Those that are the ‘real’ product sold for profit without tax, those like ‘Fest’ – an illegal brand of cigarettes that come to our shores fresh from a factory in Belarus, where its contents is virtually unknown – and those with incorrect license numbers – or those bought, packaged and sold on. 

I join two operatives behind their black-tinted windows. We speak about their role and background. 

“For us, it’s about helping these communities and making sure that the cigarettes containing substances like rat poison, are not sold to people and children,” one tells me.

“We get to go around the country visiting the places and sometimes you forget you are in the UK. People want the cigarettes and want them cheap, without realising the consequences.”

Entering the clandestine world comes at a price. For many of the group, their identities must remain anonymous in order to preserve their work and livelihood.

“Being confident and relaxed helps,” the other adds. “They have to earn your trust as they know what they’re doing is illegal.”

First stop – a factory. A worker here is selling Marlboro Lights. We meet, hand over two crumpled £20 notes and a fiver in exchange for 200 cigarettes. We have saved more than £5 per packet – the dealer has made £1.50 per deck. 

“It might not seem like much but think about a bigger operation,” Will says.

“Someone could be making a killing on this. More than £2 billion in unpaid tax – that’s more than the Foreign Office budget.”

We meet other sellers from the back of our car, before I am taken into a pub to pose as a boyfriend of someone looking for cigarettes.

Although my palms dampen, it’s all too easy. £10 and 100g of tobacco later we’re back out of the building and off to our next stop.

An exchange at the railway station and a brief break at a shop in town, and the boot of the car is now littered with cigarettes.

Will’s main role now is to forward these findings on to HMRC, with the governmental body then sending out its own investigations team to take action against all of those involved.

And maybe those involved will get justice. The only thing that is certain, is that this specialist team will continue to front up to the dangers of illicit cigarette selling.