Contraband cigarette Haul

[Upstihaggity]

It's understood that this is one of the largest seizures of contraband cigarette smuggling in the EU ever- with RTE stating that the haul is worth around €50m and would have cost the state €40m in lost revenues.
I believe that these 120 million cigarettes are to be destroyed/disposed off.


http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/1028/cigarettes.html


This is possibly a ridiculous comment- but would it not be possible for the government to arrange someway to extract profits in some way out of this haul by perhaps selling them?
- effectively 90m quid that our econony could certainly use!

 

[elefantfresh]

Supposedly, these cigarettes are "copies" which have even more dodgy stuff than normal in them.

 

[Upstihaggity]

Oh, I didn't know that.... I just thought they were cheap cigarettes (well cheaper than the ones in Ireland!)

this is why it's known as shooting the breeze I suppose!

 

[Tomodinhio]

Supposedly, these cigarettes are "copies" which have even more dodgy stuff than normal in them.

Can they actually make them that much more harmfull then they already are?

 

[DB74]

They could sell them cheap to prisoners!

 

[Latrade]

No way on earth we should allow seized contraband to become a revenue stream for the State. It does make some sense when you see the amount that has to be destroyed but there are good enough reasons why not.

First, if it's a copy, they can't guarantee its safety. No way this can be sold on. Second, it has to be stored until the court case, again even if legitimate it may not be sellable at that stage.

Last, is it really wise to rely on revenue from reselling the stuff. Not only is it asking for corruption, but if it becomes an essential revenue, then there's no incentive to stop the trade.

 

[csirl]

News reports say that the perpetrators, including a Ukrainian and Latvian from the ship, were released on bail. What are the chances we'll ever see this pair again?