Customs crack down on foreign permits
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by CM reporter
THE "foreign permits loophole" was thrown into confusion this week by a fresh version of the story from the Department of the Environment.
But one thing is certain: There will be .a crack-down on any wrong procedure. A senior Cu§toms officer told CM: "In view of recent publicity our inspectors will be looking closely at all documentation in the next few months.'
Only two weeks ago it was revealed by a DoE spokesman (CM May 14) that Continental operators' permits were not being checked when the vehicles land at UK ports. And that they could either chance not having a permit at all or that they could re-use single-trip permits time after time.
But now the DoE has done a complete about face. For Dr John Gilbert, Minister for Transport, said in the Commons on Monday that he was satisfied that the procedures for checking the permits worked well!
Dr Gilbert said that his Department's enforcement staff carried out spot-checks at all roll-on roll-off ports and that these checks were supple:. mented by Customs officers. Which is a different story to the one that CM was originally given when it launched a probe into allegations by Mr Marcus Fox, MP, Tory Party vice-chairman.
He claimed that hauliers were coming into Britain and that their permits were not being stamped to show that they had been used. He believed that the loophole had developed because of a "Who does what?" dispute between the Customs and Excise and the DoE.
Terribly vital
This was confirmed in part by the DoE spokesman, who • said : "We found that in the past foreign hauliers had never used their full quota of permits and so checking was not terribly vital.
"But more than a year ago we found that the quota was being used and that something had to be done. The DoE couldn't check the permits so the job was handed over to the Customs, but it appears to have fallen by the wayside.
"Now the Customs have accepted their responsibilities and will be doing the job in due course."
That reply to .CM's questions prompted Mr Norman Fowler, Tory spokesman on transport. to ask the Minister just what was going on and resulted in the new version of the situation.
On Tuesday the DoE held a press conference to try ix) clear up the matter. It was said that unless Marcus Fox, MP, can produce evidence to support his allegations of misuse of International Road Haulage Permits by foreign hauliers the DoE will not recommend any special action to Dr Gilbert. A spokesman for the DoE told CM this week that he "hopes the allegations are a storm in a tea cup."
A Customs and Excise spokesman in London said this week that their men are instructed to examine and stamp the permits and they have no evidence that this is not being done. "We would have expected the DoE, the RHA or Parliamentary sources to have complained," he said. But he agreed with the DoE official that a 100 per cent check was impossible. "Complete control," he said, "would disrupt international traffic."
Under the Road Transport (Foreign Vehicles) Act 1972 a DoE official has powers to detain a driver with a faulty document. The Customs officer has no such power. In the event of a foreign operator attemptnig to enter the UK without a permit or with an out-of-date permit the Customs officer must contact DoE hq to arrange for the vehicle to be detained. Officers of both Departments agree that vehicles might enter Britain without valid permits when ferries land at times when DoE headquarters are closed.
A DoE spokesman said that since French operators still do not use their full quota of 35,000 permits there would seem to be little point in their using invalid permits. He agreed, however, that permits are allocated only to French operators who hold Inter national Road Haulage Licences. An operator without such a licence could be tempted to use an invalid permit.
Although the DoE can ask bilateral partners to return used permits this is not done • because, according to the spokesman, it would be "tedious and time wasting."