The measure is billed as a bid to crack down on tobacco smuggling. However, a HM Revenue and Customs spokesman said the powers could be applied much more widely. Currently, Royal Mail staff have a legal right to intercept suspicious letters and parcels in mail centres and sorting offices and pass them to HM Revenue and Customs.
Tax inspectors must then notify the addressee and agree a mutually acceptable time to open the letter or parcel, before deciding whether to take any enforcement acdtion. However the Government is now proposing to remove the legal requirement which will now allow inspectors to open suspicious post without asking permission first.
Treasury documents say: “HMRC will no longer be required to notify the addressee and invite them to attend before such packets can be opened”. The new measure will be passed into law as part of the Budget over the next few weeks, and amend section 106 of the Postal Services Act 2000.
Under current law, the only other enforcement officers who can open mail are border guards who can open the post without permission at ports and airports. Civil liberties campaigners were appalled about the increased powers. Alex Deane, a spokesman for Big Brother Watch, said: “This is a dreadful development. The post has always been regarded as near-sacrosanct in law.
“The last time our mail was opened by the authorities without notice, our country was fighting a World War. I hardly think that the situation produced by the government’s tobacco tax compares. Once the principle of opening our mail has been accepted, what else will the Government use as an excuse to pry into our post?”
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