From: Daily Mail
- Black market booming thanks to ‘invisibility’ provided by online shopping
- Criminals are sending guns, drugs and illegal cigarettes through the post
- More than a million such parcels are sent to British homes every year
- Illegal tobacco remains one of the most commonly smuggled products
- Drugs are smuggled from India, guns from the US and clothes from China
By Corey Charlton for MailOnline
The black market is booming thanks to the ‘invisibility’ of online shopping as more and more criminals smuggle guns, drugs and counterfeit goods into Britain through the post.
More than a million parcels containing such items are sent to British homes each year, costing the taxman more than £3billion, a year-long study has revealed.
And efforts to crack down on the illicit trade are hampered by poor co-operation between agencies such as Revenue & Customs and the Border Force.
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One of the most commonly smuggled products is illegal tobacco, which is then sold under the counter in shops throughout Britain.
Last year it was reported that efforts to reduce smoking and improve health were being hampered by the black market trade of millions of illegal cigarettes filled with excrement, dead flies and asbestos.
The Local Government Association (LGA) said fake cigarettes also posed a fire risk, damaged honest businesses and cost the UK economy around £3billion a year in unpaid duty.
