Customs on tv 2 – The Collectors

The Collectors was a BBC1 series which ran for 10 episodes on Saturday evenings from March to May 1986. Unlike, The Revenue Men, it focussed on the uniformed HM Customs and Excise staff based at the Custom House in a small port called Welling (filmed at Poole).

Peter McEnery starred as Harry Caines, the new Surveyor at Welling District, drafted in from Heathrow Airport to sharpen up performance. “Chumminess is a thing of the past,” he warns his staff. Created by Welsh writer, Ewart Alexander (Kings Royal, Juliet Bravo) the series featured a cross-section of characters. Michael Billington (UFO, The Onedin Line) played Tom Gibbons, a Higher Executive Officer, resentful at being passed over for the Surveyor’s job and placating a rich and spoilt young wife (Karen Drury, later of Brookside).

Jack McKenzie played bearded HEO Calvin Simpson, never happier than when aboard his Customs launch, The Seal. Lois Butlin (Grange Hill) was Alyson Bentley , horse riding, fast-driving Executive Officer, who brings down a smuggler in the first episode. William Whymper played Bruce Tomlin, a graduate EO who, in his spare time is writing a scholarly publication on seagrass and coastal erosion. Robert Burbage played Nigel Markham, a young and inexperienced Assistant Officer. The BBC stated in publicity that this was the first time HM Customs and Excise had co-operated in the making of a TV series. Bruce Gill, an Assistant Collector from London was the technical advisor, and said, “ It is first class. It shows for the first time the types of work we do that the public don’t know about. It doesn’t just concentrate on VAT collection or our work at ports of entry. Taxes are collectible only with the consent of the taxpayer. This should help gain co-operation.” He added that, “People will be surprised at the low-approach we take. “

Caine’s strategy for shaking up the uniformed staff involves rotating them around other taxes and duties. Whether or not that would have worked for the unions in real-life, dramatically it enabled them to cover all the bases. 

In Go For Gold, Bruce Tomlin who has 3 years previous experience in VAT, is sent to audit the returns of a dodgy hairdresser, suspected of gold smuggling. The VAT surveyor* insists that Caines supervises the visit so that, “if anything goes wrong, I’m off the hook and you’re on it.” While the hairdresser’s books are clean, Caines uncovers his secret stash of coins in true classic detective style, through an obscure piece of knowledge not taught at Basic VAT Training.

(*For those interested in obscure TV technicalities. The actor playing the VAT surveyor (above) is unbilled in the Go For Gold end credits. He is Leonard Kavanagh, who was credited in the first episode playing John Bryce, a soon-to-retire Excise HEO. McEnery later suggests to Billington that he move to Excise to replace Bryce. In that first episode there is a scene (below) where Bryce is sitting in the pub with the Customs staff. In the novelisation of that scene Calvin asks him if he is “tired of Excise,” but in the TV show we hear Calvin’s voice say "tired of VAT". Bryce replies, in what is now a non sequitur: "Excise has been good to me." Suggesting that Calvin's question about VAT has been dubbed in.)

(We can only assume that for some reason they got Leonard Kavanagh to cover the role of the VAT surveyor, (named in the novelisation Jim Benson). Perhaps at the same time they filmed the first episode. And tried to cover it up with a bit of overdubbed reference to VAT. Anyway, a mystery that indicates there were problems with the making of the show – thanks to Dame Agnes Guano for help in identifying Kavanagh.)

In Swings and Roundabouts, Alyson is assigned to the Road Fuel Testing Unit as it pursues wealthy farmer Jeffrey Marriott-Smith (Edward De Souza), the mastermind behind the diversion of excise duty rebated red diesel. Wily De Souza has a hundred dodges, such as claiming his garage is part of a private dwelling that the RFTU have no right to enter – and then driving his jeep out of a back door! The background music treats the pursuit of the farmer as a playful romp and it’s really down to De Souza to sell the arrogance of the man (“You jumped up corporals are all the same!”).

As a side issue Alyson appeals to Caines to help farmer Eric Hall (Eric Carte) when his car is seized for running on red. When he finds out that Hall’s wife has been paying on VAT on assessments rather than full accounts, he sends Bruce in to do an audit. Reviewer William Marshall commented in the Halifax Evening Courier for 22 March that, “I never thought I would witness a series among the heroes of which was a VAT inspector, but one of the sub-plots of last Saturday’s offering showed a VAT-man spreading sweetness and light by giving a struggling farmer a £2,000 rebate.” 

In fact, the scene in which the Hall’s learn they are due a rebate has all the truthfulness of the “Low Cost Funeral” adverts you see on Daytime TV. Meanwhile, a coincidental spot by Caines on his boat enables Calvin (with some legal prompts on the 1973 Hydrocarbon Oil Regulations from Oona Kirsch) to finally nail Marriott-Smith filling marine diesel into a concealed tank in the back of his jeep (“You bastard.” “Customs and Excise do try, sir, but some of us still slip through.”)

Major Barclay’s Last Stand, by John Harrison, feels like a change of pace. The title character is a pensioner (Lionel Jeffries ) and ex-army officer running a small private unit of smugglers (including Victor Maddern and Betty Marsden), who Calvin speculates are doing it for thrills as much as profit. Caines shadows them to Cherbourg where they buy low duty booze to smuggle in to order. Jeffries is still razor-sharp as a bitter, disenchanted man who is finally laid low in the “Nothing to Declare” channel. McEnery sidles up to him as he’s arguing with Robert Burbage and convinces Jeffries that it’s better to pay the duty, rather than go to court and see his dishonour reported in the press.

The Great Ice-Cream War opens with background music and acting worthy of The Sooty Show as rival Ice Cream sellers fight over their pitches. Caines and Bruce go in to audit both firms, discussing the numerous dodges Ice Cream sellers can use to “short-change children.” While Bruce introduces the loveable “Eetaliano, Momma and Poppa” firm to the concept of recording cash takings before you spend them, Caines has to call in Calvin to witness an attempted bribe from the owner of the rival firm. Shadowing of the vans by the local Investigation Division uncovers a £50,000 VAT fiddle. 

In The Dog It Was, Mark Eden plays a boat owner who suspects his daughter’s dog has rabies when it turns vicious on its return from France. Following a tip-off that the dog has run ashore, Calvin questions the pair and uncovers the truth. The daughter (Karin Cartlidge) is mourning the loss of her mother, and as Caines chats to her in the Custom House waiting room, they both come to a realisation about grief – that you can spend too long avoiding the loss in a dog or work.   As the Manchester Evening News reported (12 April 1986), the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries sent out a message “on salmon-pink stationery, pointing out the ‘timely warning’ in tonight’s episode…that rabies is ‘a deadly viral infection, which affects animals and man…inevitably fatal…offenders face unlimited fines.”

Throughout the series, the ‘Blakes Seven principle’ of the single lurking villain was applied as it gradually emerged that wealthy French society host Charles Thieron (Pierre Vaneck) was behind multiple crimes – including taking out his opponents with a rifle or bombs, tempting Sue Gibbons with a smuggled Krugerrand (Go For Gold), using  Calvin’s new girlfriend Annie Solstrom (Julia Goodman) as a drugs courier and even smuggling a Gyr falcon in contravention of CITES (in Rare Bird). 

As noted, the Investigation Division was not a big part of this series, although Michael Cochrane made several appearances as Chris Lucas, an ID officer having a long-distance relationship with Alyson. In episode 6, Uncommon Market, Chris is killed in road accident while pursuing two of Thieron’s men. Alyson goes through a suppressed grieving process, finally finding catharsis in true BBC style in episode 10 by taking part in the Horse of the Year show at Wembley!

Some critics complained about the intrusive background music which often hit the wrong tone. The theme tune itself is unfortunately more suited to a Daytime Tv Quiz Show. Critics also found the first episode turgid and confusing in its introduction of several characters. But writing in the Nottingham Evening Post (6 May 1986) Betty Boyden concluded that, “the cast may have contained many unknowns, but it is to their credit – and the credit of the scriptwriters – that over the past weeks they have managed to become people we were very pleased to meet on Saturday nights.”

Although the series is not out on DVD or iplayer, Evan Christie’s novelisation captures what some critics referred to as the sitcom level of delivery: in an early scene young AO Nigel is tidying the Long Room is preparation for Caines’ arrival. “A pile of Portcullises, the customs newspaper, lay on the counter, and Nigel decided to start with these. They were covered with a layer of dust and Nigel made the mistake of blowing on them. A cloud of dust erupted onto his face, causing him to cough and splutter.” (To be fair, on tv the scene cuts before the coughing and spluttering.)

Writing in The People (Sunday 2 March 1986) Margaret Forwood wise-cracked that she was distracted wondering where she’d seen Tom Gibbon before. “Then I twigged it. It was dear old Michael Billington, concealed underneath a far more luxuriant toupee than the one he used to wear in the days of Spearhead.” On his own website, the late Michael Billington said that he’d originally been approached by director Marc Miller to play the role of ill-fated ID officer Chris Lucas. On meeting producer Geraint Morris he’d been offered the larger role of Tom Gibbon. Unfortunately, “it came out as a hangover from the kind of stuffy product both the BBC and Yorkshire had had a lot of success with in the 1970’s. The show was axed because it wasn’t very good. There was casual talk of a second series but I don’t think anyone believed it.”

With only 10 episodes instead of the usual 13, it suggests that there wasn’t a lot of confidence in The Collectors. However, Customs and Excise did seem pleased enough with the show to coincidentally launch a recruitment exercise in the same month!