The Revenue and Customs Prosecution Office (RCPO) was a

non-departmental public body In the United Kingdom, non-departmental public body (NDPB) is a classification applied by the Cabinet Office, Treasury, the Scottish Government, and the Northern Ireland Executive to public sector organisations that have a role in the process o ...

created under the

Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005 The Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005 (c 11) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which combined the Inland Revenue and HM Customs and Excise into a single government department, HM Revenue and Customs. The Act also ...

as an independent prosecution body to take responsibility in the

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

Wales Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...

and

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ; ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, part of the United Kingdom in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It has been #Descriptions, variously described as a country, province or region. Northern Ireland shares Repub ...

for the

prosecution A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the adversarial system, which is adopted in common law, or inquisitorial system, which is adopted in Civil law (legal system), civil law. The prosecution is the ...

criminal offence In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in Ca ...

s in cases previously within the purview of the

Inland Revenue The Inland Revenue was, until April 2005, a department of the British Government responsible for the collection of direct taxation, including income tax, national insurance contributions, capital gains tax, inheritance tax, corporation ta ...

and

HM Customs and Excise HM Customs and Excise (properly known as Her Majesty's Customs and Excise at the time of its dissolution) was a department of the British Government formed in 1909 by the merger of HM Customs and HM Excise; its primary responsibility was the ...

(HMCE). In

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

it was a Specialist Reporting Agency and the cases are then prosecuted by the

Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service () is the independent public prosecution service for Scotland, and is a Ministerial Department of the Scottish Government. The department is headed by His Majesty's Lord Advocate, who under t ...

. It was merged with the

Crown Prosecution Service The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is the principal public agency for conducting criminal prosecutions in England and Wales. It is headed by the Director of Public Prosecutions. The main responsibilities of the CPS are to provide legal adv ...

on 1 January 2010.

History

An increase in the independence of prosecutors from the compliance and investigation staff at the revenue departments was recommended by the Gower-Hammond Report in December 2000 and the Butterfield report in July 2003 following recent scandals and failed prosecutions, including the collapse of the London City Bond trial for evasion of tens of millions of pounds of

excise duties file:Lincoln Beer Stamp 1871.JPG, upright=1.2, 1871 U.S. Revenue stamp for 1/6 barrel of beer. Brewers would receive the stamp sheets, cut them into individual stamps, cancel them, and paste them over the Bunghole, bung of the beer barrel so when ...

as a result of the non-disclosure of the involvement of an unpaid Customs informant. The RCPO was established on 18 April 2005, and was independent of

HM Revenue and Customs His Majesty's Revenue and Customs (commonly HM Revenue and Customs, or HMRC, and formerly Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs) is a department of the UK government responsible for the collection of taxes, the payment of some forms of stat ...

(the new government department also created on 18 April 2005 under the Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005 by the

merger Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of a company, business organization, or one of their operating units is transferred to or consolidated with another entity. They may happen through direct absorpt ...

of the Inland Revenue and HMCE). A memorandum of understanding laid out the boundaries between the work of the RCPO and HMRC. The RCPO is superintended by the

Attorney General In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general (: attorneys general) or attorney-general (AG or Atty.-Gen) is the main legal advisor to the government. In some jurisdictions, attorneys general also have executive responsibility for law enf ...

, and David Green QC was appointed as the first Director of the Customs and Excise Prosecutions in December 2004. RCPO coordinated its efforts with those of the

(CPS) and, from its inception in April 2006, the

Serious Organised Crime Agency The Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) was a non-departmental public body of the Government of the United Kingdom which existed from 1 April 2006 until 7 October 2013. SOCA was a national law enforcement agency with Home Office sponsorship, e ...

(SOCA). In its first year, to April 2006, it dealt with over 1700 cases, with over 75% guilty pleas and convictions in 90% of cases; obtained 411 confiscation orders, for a total of £36,617,204, of which £21,167,236 was collected by 11 April 2006. On 11 April 2006, it had 255 staff, including 80 lawyers, and an annual budget of £35.6 million. Following an announcement by the Attorney General in April 2009, on 1 January 2010 the RCPO was merged with the Crown Prosecution Service, forming a new Revenue and Customs Division within the CPS, with the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP), Keir Starmer, additionally being appointed to the statutory position of Director of Revenue and Customs Prosecutions. That office was abolished and merged with the office of DPP on 27 March 2014.Public Bodies (Merger of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Director of Revenue and Customs Prosecutions) Order 2014
/ref>

Organisation

RCPO was created by the

, as an independent prosecuting authority similar to the Crown Prosecution Service, but primarily prosecuting cases investigated by HM Revenue and Customs. Although RCPO began work when the CRC Act came into force in April 2005, its prosecutors were initially drawn from the merger of the Customs & Excise Prosecutions Office (CEPO) (which was itself established in 2003 from the previous HM Customs and Excise Solicitors' Office) and the Inland Revenue Crime Group. It had approximately 290 staff, including around 80 lawyers, based at New King's Beam House in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

SE1 and Ralli Quays in

Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...

. The RCPO equivalent to CPS Crown Prosecutors were called "Revenue and Customs Prosecutors". The RCPO handled approximately 2,500 cases each year. In its first six months, RCPO concluded 858 cases with convictions in 88% of them. It dealt with cases of fraud in relation to

direct tax Although the actual definitions vary between jurisdictions, in general, a direct tax is a tax imposed upon a person or property as distinct from a tax imposed upon a transaction, which is described as an indirect tax. There is a distinction betwee ...

es (

income tax An income tax is a tax imposed on individuals or entities (taxpayers) in respect of the income or profits earned by them (commonly called taxable income). Income tax generally is computed as the product of a tax rate times the taxable income. Tax ...

capital gains tax A capital gains tax (CGT) is the tax on profits realized on the sale of a non-inventory asset. The most common capital gains are realized from the sale of stocks, bonds, precious metals, real estate, and property. In South Africa, capital g ...

inheritance tax International tax law distinguishes between an estate tax and an inheritance tax. An inheritance tax is a tax paid by a person who inherits money or property of a person who has died, whereas an estate tax is a levy on the estate (money and pro ...

corporation tax A corporate tax, also called corporation tax or company tax or corporate income tax, is a type of direct tax levied on the income or capital of corporations and other similar legal entities. The tax is usually imposed at the national level, but i ...

) and

indirect tax An indirect tax (such as a sales tax, per unit tax, value-added tax (VAT), excise tax, consumption tax, or tariff) is a tax that is levied upon goods and services before they reach the customer who ultimately pays the indirect tax as a part of ...

es (mainly

VAT A value-added tax (VAT or goods and services tax (GST), general consumption tax (GCT)) is a consumption tax that is levied on the value added at each stage of a product's production and distribution. VAT is similar to, and is often compared wi ...

– notably multimillion-pound Missing Trader Intra-Community ("carousel") frauds),

tax credit A tax credit is a tax incentive which allows certain taxpayers to subtract the amount of the credit they have accrued from the total they owe the state. It may also be a credit granted in recognition of taxes already paid or a form of state "dis ...

drug smuggling The illegal drug trade, drug trafficking, or narcotrafficking is a global black market dedicated to the cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of prohibited drugs. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types ...

, and

money laundering Money laundering is the process of illegally concealing the origin of money obtained from illicit activities (often known as dirty money) such as drug trafficking, sex work, terrorism, corruption, and embezzlement, and converting the funds i ...

, cases involving United Nations trade sanctions, conflict diamonds and

CITES CITES (shorter acronym for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, also known as the Washington Convention) is a multilateral treaty to protect endangered plants and animals from the threats of inte ...

. The majority of cases involved drug trafficking prosecutions.

References

External links

RCPO website

*''Introducing RCPO'', David Green QC, '' Tax Journal'', 21 November 2005
Revenue and Customs Prosecutions Office marks first year successes
, RCPO press release PN06/0002, 11 April 2006 {{DEFAULTSORT:Revenue And Customs Prosecutions Office Defunct non-departmental public bodies of the United Kingdom government HM Revenue and Customs 2005 establishments in the United Kingdom 2010 disestablishments in the United Kingdom