Customs & Excise must step in to meet the cost of drugs sniffer dogs SNP Shadow Justice Minister Ms Roseanna Cunningham MSP said today (Thursday) after it was revealed that islanders in Shetland had been forced to pay for a dog team out of their own pocket.

Ms Cunningham slated Customs for withdrawing all sniffer dog teams from Scotland and demanded that the policy be reversed. Commenting she said:

"Communities across Scotland have been left wide open to drug smuggling because of the massive cuts in Customs under Labour.

"There is now not a single sniffer dog team based north of the border.
People's frustration at this abdication of responsibility has reached the point where Shetlanders have been forced to pay for their own dog team.

"This frustration is felt in rural communities across Scotland and
Shetlanders are not alone in feeling betrayed by Customs & Excise.

"It is a nonsense however, that they are now having pay twice for a service hat should be supplied by Customs - once through their taxes and again by having to put their hand in their own pocket to provide sniffer dogs.

"The Government must now step in and find the funding for the Shetland
sniffer dogs and Customs and Excise must return the dog teams they have withdrawn from Scotland. Anything less will be an admission that they are unwilling to fight the drugs menace."