Government Announces £30m High Street Crime Unit After BBC Exposé of Illegal Tobacco, Money Laundering and £1bn Criminal Cash Flow

The government announced a new High Street organised crime unit that will cost £30m over three years after a BBC investigation documented widespread illegal activity in shops across the country. About two-thirds of the funding will go to the National Crime Agency to hire 75 officers. The remainder will support Trading Standards and tax and immigration authorities.

The BBC team began its reporting in February 2025 and visited Plymouth, Rochdale, Shrewsbury, Newport and Bradford. In Hull, investigators found underground tunnels supplying sacks of illegal cigarettes to High Street mini-marts. In Swansea, officers smashed windows of stash cars used to hide illegal cigarettes during the day and deal drugs at night.

Freedom of Information requests showed that more than 3,600 shops across the UK had illegal goods such as counterfeit cigarettes, tobaccos and vapes seized during 2024-25. The National Crime Agency estimates that at least £1bn of criminal cash is laundered through UK High Street stores each year. The BBC team was repeatedly attacked and threatened during its reporting.

It also exposed a Kurdish gang that enabled migrants to work illegally in mini-marts by putting their own names on official paperwork. Trading Standards said it finds a constant supply of staff from asylum hotels working in those shops who are vulnerable to abuse by employers. The then-Home Secretary Yvette Cooper described some of the BBC's findings as a disgrace.

Staff numbers at Trading Standards fell from 4,260 in 2002 to 2,378 in 2025. The National Crime Agency carried out an operation last year and found organised High Street crime gangs in every part of the UK. The government has ordered a rapid review of local responders' powers, in particular whether Trading Standards should be able to close a potentially criminal shop for longer than the initial three months.