Customs and Excise Management Act 1979

113 Power to search for concealed pipes, etc.

(1) If an officer has reasonable grounds to suspect that any secret pipe or other means of conveyance, cock, vessel or utensil is kept or used by a revenue trader to whom this section applies, that officer may, subject to subsection (2) below, at any time, break open any part of the premises of that trader and forcibly enter thereon and so far as is reasonably necessary break up the ground in or adjoining those premises or any wall thereof to search for that pipe or other means of conveyance, cock, vessel or utensil.

(2) No officer shall exercise the powers conferred on him by subsection (1) above by night unless he is accompanied by a constable.

(3) If the officer finds any such pipe or other form of conveyance leading to or from the trader's premises, he may enter any other premises from or into which it leads, and so far as is reasonably necessary break up any part of those other premises to trace its course, and may cut it away and turn any cock thereon, and examine whether it conveys or conceals any goods chargeable with a duty of excise, or any materials used in the manufacture of such goods, in such manner as to prevent a true account thereof from being taken.

(4) Every such pipe or other means of conveyance, cock, vessel or utensil as aforesaid, and all goods chargeable with a duty of excise or materials for the manufacture of such goods found therein, shall be liable to forfeiture, and the trader shall be liable on summary conviction to a penalty of £100.

(5) If any damage is done in any such search as aforesaid and the search is unsuccessful, the Commissioners shall make good the damage.

(6) The revenue traders to whom this section applies are distillers, rectifiers, compounders, brewers for sale, producers of wine, producers of made-wine and makers of cider.

(7) This section also applies to the occupier of a refinery as it applies to the traders mentioned in subsection (6) above, whether or not the occupier is a revenue trader.