Beer Group sides with BBPA against “catastrophic” beer stamps
By: JimOldfield
July 26th, 2012
The All-Party Parliamentary Beer Group has backed the British Beer and Pub Association’s stance against the introduction of beer tax stamps – which the BBPA warns could cause an industry catastrophe.
The beer group has been conducting an independent inquiry into duty fraud – with the tax stamps proposed as one of the measures to combat tax fiddling.
But while the group said its finding were that fraud was a serious problem, it concluded that the time was not right for the introduction of beer tax stamps.
Relieved UK brewers immediately expressed support for all the recommendations outlined in the group’s report into fraud.
The group concluded: “It is clear to us that this is a serious problem; beer tax fraud continuing unchecked has a corrosive social impact and repercussions reaching far beyond the brewing industry.
“It has also become evident that no single measure is likely to have a marked effect on its own.
“However, we consider a series of measures targeted at specific aspects of the problem may work to disrupt the business models of the organised criminal gangs behind the fraud, without imposing disproportionate burdens on the legitimate producers, suppliers, retailers and consumers of beer.”
The group concluded that beer fraud had spread from the domain of White Van Man to become the the business of organised criminal gangs, dealing in truckloads of illicit beer.
But the BBPA had warned that relying on stamping every single bottle of beer with a tax stamp would cost the brewers at least £100m every year and would wipe out smaller breweries and pubs.
The BBPA has now called for the setting up of a new joint Government and industry anti-fraud task force.
BBPA chief executive, Brigid Simmonds said: “I want to thank Andrew Griffiths, John Healey and the All Party Parliamentary Beer Group, who have jointly undertaken a very thorough investigation, and have concluded that the time is not right for the introduction of beer tax stamps or supply chain legislation.
“They are right to be concerned over the very damaging effect these plans would have on the UK brewing and pub industry, and of equal importance, the reduced choice this would mean for beer drinkers.
“We endorse all of the report’s recommendations – and we must work more closely together to pursue more criminal prosecutions against those involved in fraud.
“To this end, we invite HMRC and all other stakeholders to join us in tackling the problem through a new Task Force, which should be set up as soon as possible so it can start delivering results.”
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