30/01/2012 Inside Out London

Hello, and tonight Inside Out is in Nottingham to investigate the

dangers of bootleg booze. Coming up, the fake vodka victim who could

have gone blind, and says the people who make it don't care about

the damage done. There are affecting people's lives, possibly

for the long term. For me, it has been since November and I am still

affected now. Is Nottingham making enough of its

local legend? Robin Hood has fallen into this apathy and lack of

interest, almost an embarrassment. Andrew Good time travelling at the

beautiful Belton House. -- and we An explosion, which killed five men

at an industrial unit in Lincolnshire, revealed the secret

world of bootleg booze. They died in a small garage lock-up where

fake vodka was being produced. So what potentially lethal concoctions

are out there? And where are they coming from? In the first detailed

insight into this highly organised crime, Inside Out lifts the lid on

the dangers of this growing illegal RADIO: News overnight that five

people have been killed in Boston in Lancashire. Sarah Sturdey is

there. How does it look? There's A police tape prevents us going round

the corner to witness the devastating impact...

The explosion revealed the secret world of bootleg booze. Inside the

charred unit, fake vodka was manufactured. It looked just like

this, the genuine article. The blast open the public's eyes to

this highly dangerous scam. It is often really hard to tell the

difference between a fake like this, seized at a Leicestershire but they

factory and the real thing. Drinking the wrong one could prove

fatal. The fake brands disguise a lethal

blend of chemicals. They don't care for anyone, they only care about

lining their own pocket. The criminal gangs cost the

taxpayer �1 billion a year by failing to pay alcohol duty.

Vodka is the easiest spirit to copy. You can make it on Monday and sell

it on Tuesday. But it's the drinkers who pay the

highest price, sometimes with their eyesight. I feel lucky to be alive.

I did not think I would ever get out of bed again. Hidden in a

remote corner of Leicestershire, one organised gang of bootleggers

went undetected. Until undercover customs officers finally tracked

them down to a rented unit. They were making fake vodka, at a place

RADIO: We have found the subject that you're looking for. Excellent,

thank you very much. It was a wonderful feeling to know we had

cracked it. They have opened the rear of the lorry now, somebody is

in a top and blue jeans messing around with the palette on the back.

We have identified them. It is good to know they are all in one place.

No problem, they have not paid any attention to us. We will go in

steady, and we will be on our way back. Thanks very much indeed.

During the raid, 70 customs officers found a makeshift factory

producing illegal vodka on a massive scale. The unit had the

capacity to produce a bottle every five seconds. There was enough

methylated spirit to produce They had a bid stainless steel tank

which held the finished product before dropping it down on to a

bottler nine -- a big stainless- steel tank. Then they had a

commercial capping machine which put the counterfeit caps on the

bottles. It then passed down a conveyor belt to a leading machine

which took the label on. -- labelling machine. I have visited

thousands of spirit bottling plants all over the world and they have

never seen anything like this. Absolutely horrendous. It could

have been a disaster in the make in. Ed Binsted is a spirits industry

safety expert. His evidence in the trial of the convicted bootleggers

revealed how a simple spark could ignite alcohol vapours, triggering

a major explosion. This place was a timebomb waiting

to go off. Look what happened in Boston and places popping up all

over the UK and if anybody had been walking on this public footpath or

on a horse, they would have been involved in this as well. I drive

past here a few times a week and when I found out what was going on

in the shed, it is unbelievable. You can't believe how something

like that could go on in a place like this. It is quite frightening

and shocking, really. The gang of six has been sentenced

to a total of more than 20 years in jail. The mastermind, who was never

seen at Moscow Farm, was Kevin Eddishaw. His right-hand man was

John Humphreys. But the chemist, the man who knew how to add bleach

to meths so it looked like vodka, was Wojciech Herbst from Poland.

found that the counterfeiters had done a very good job of forging the

bottles and the labels. The bottles were sourced from a genuine brand

suppliers. We believe the labels came from Poland so the product

look like the real thing. Customs officers believe the meths

was smuggled from Poland. The finished product transported from

Moscow Farm by the lorryload, then stored near East Bridgford in

Nottinghamshire. 5,000 litres were seized in Blackpool. It was found

on sale at small independent off- licences across the country in

We observed John Humphreys meeting with one of his clients near East

Bridgford. He had left the client in the car park while he went away

in the van to get the fake vodka from the storage nearby.

Counterfeit alcohol is now being seized across the country daily.

It's a top priority for trading standards.

We've seized this in other parts of the county. It's industrial, not

agricultural alcohol. Stuff you keep out of harm's way like

cleaning fluids, paint stripper, meths. Not something you would want

to be It can make you blind. People have been hospitalised. One even

died. The person in this off- licence has just been convicted of

containing four fake brands including chloroform found in

pesticides. Students are on the lookout for cheap vodka. Lauren

Platts from Derbyshire bought what she now knows to be a bogus brand

for �5.99. The man in the off- licence near her Sheffield digs

joked, it would blind her. Two months on, he wasn't far wrong.

was throwing up. I was not able to get out of bed. The second day I

thought... Am I ever going to feel better? I could not see very well.

My vision blurs, I have black blotches. I tend to lose my

peripheral vision. Even crossing the road can be difficult. It is

really scary. When you can't see anything or if you are driving.

Even walking down the street trying to cross the road.

Casualty departments are starting to see more patients who think

they've drunk vodka, but it's really industrial alcohol. They are

drinking the same amount they are drinking normally but getting much

more intense symptoms. Thinking they have been spiked. The symptoms

described are much more severe abdominal pain, staggering and

feeling nauseous, much more intense vomiting and also a visual problems.

He do not -- you do not tend to see that with normal alcohol. The optic

nerve can be attacked and that can cause permanent blindness. That

runs from behind the eye and that can cause permanent blindness.

Back at Great Dalby near Moscow Farm, the pub landlady is shocked

at the ticking timebomb which was on their doorstep. But can she tell

the difference between a fake from the factory and the real bottle?

No, I can't. I can't believe it. Everything is exactly the same.

you surprised? That's shocking, it's scary. Oh, my God.

There's one simple error, the forgers got the bottle's units

wrong. They put 28 units. Much of the Moscow Farm fake vodka could

still be out there, along with thousands of other dangerous bogus

brands. The vodka distillers are well aware of the threat the

bootleggers pose. The industry needs to stay one step

ahead for them and the public. But it's customs officers who face

the challenge of seeking out these highly organised criminals.

We need to find these places and dismantle them, so they can't

operate ever again. The UK's consumption of real vodka

has risen considerably over the past ten years. As drinkers seek

out cheap booze, the bootleggers are leaving a lethal legacy. It is

shocking that someone is telling that to people and they obviously

don't care. If it is still happening now, the problems with my

vision, I would assume it is here for good and this is all from just

The Robin Hood legend has been bringing tourists to Nottingham for

as long as we can remember. But is the city really making their visit

worthwhile and giving them the outlaw experience they come looking

for? Some would say not. Radio Leicester's Breakfast Show

presenter Ben Jackson is a stranger to Nottingham so we challenged him

to come and find out whether we give Robin Hood tourists value for

The heart of Robin Hood County, BBC Radio Nottingham.

Well, I'm in the right place. These days when we're all strapped for

cash, cashing in on your assets sounds like a sensible idea. And

some of our cities come fully equipped with famous characters to

bring the tourists flooding in. But I think that Nottingham has the

ultimate cash cow. Robin Hood, and it's the first time I've been on

the Robin Hood tourist trail so I've come to Nottingham to how it's

competing with the other UK cities to bring in the tourists. For about

800 years there have been stories of how Robin has roamed these lands.

Stories passed down the centuries. But it is all a great story, Robin

from the rich to feed the poor and getting one over on the

Widow of the gums, stories and fables, surely this is the place to

meet the hooded man -- with all of the films, stories and fables.

The name Robin Hood was celebrated in Nottingham in the 1950s. Today,

it should be a multi-million-pound business for the city but there is

Frankly, the map is a fat lot of good. Time to break out the

official or deer trail -- official audio trail. Let's see if that can

give me a few more clues. Taking the road to Nottingham was

risky for an outlaw. Today, it is a vibrant cosmopolitan city but for

Robin had it was home to his arch enemy, the Sheriff of Nottingham.

Near by on Maid Marion Way, you can visit Robin Hood himself at the

Belton House. This cannot be it, surely? I have

followed all of the signs and the audio trail I have come to their

derelict shop. This is rubbish. I give up. Where do I find Robin Hood

tourist attractions in Nottingham? Let us ask the experts. I have come

out of the Tourist Information Centre and they are perfectly nice

people but I asked them if there was a map to find some things about

Robin had and nobody knew what I was talking about. Apparently, the

best place to find out something about Robin Herd is to drive 20

miles away out of the city -- about Robin Hood. Am I wasting what I'm

looking for Robin Hood in Nottingham?

I think Robin had is everywhere. You will find the castle, the

Galleries of Justice Museum, both of them have new exhibitions -- I

think Robin Hood is everywhere. We have a new costume actor trail as

well. Why isn't anyone telling us that these exist? I have just been

directed to the statue and Castle and to Sherwood Forest. A Sherwood

Forest is one of the major draws of Nottinghamshire but there are so

many different things, maybe we need to signpost them better and

package them up in a more user- friendly Robin Hood Way. 20 miles

north of the city, there are still remnants of Nottingham's ancient

remnants. If you scratch below the surface, it is medieval and Robin

had related history is still very much apparent. Like this hidden gem.

So much of the story of Robin Hood is lost in myths and legends, but

this is king John's house. That means that if Robin had did really

exist then he knew that these stones. Amazing. All this history

certainly makes Nottinghamshire a county to be proud of. The next

couple of stops will unravel the thread of fact and fiction from

this rich tapestry of myth and history. Let us see what we can

unearth from the annals of history. This way. This local actor feels

that the City does not make enough of its medieval history but he is

determined that the Robin had a legend there should be kept alive.

The beauty of Robin Hood is that in pursuing the character, you are

going on a journey through English Heritage, culture and the arts.

Robin had was a product of the Creative artists over the centuries.

-- Robin had was a product. He is a symbol of truth, justice, charity

and freedom and these are ideals that everybody wants around the

world. He has his own views on where the city is going wrong.

Robin had has fallen into apathy and lacking interest and

embarrassment. That is the fault of attractions like the Belton House.

There was no pride invested in it. It descended into a beer warehouse

for corporate parties. The Tales of Robin Hood turned into a nail in

This is a bit more like it. I have come to the Robin Hood pageant at

Nottingham Castle. People seem to be having a great time but is it

enough for those of us who want to know more about Nottingham's

medieval history? It is better than what we expected. It has been

really good. Cities all over the country let themselves down by not

promoting their historical heritage. It is educational as well for the

children. Do you think Nottingham needs more of this? I do. This only

happens once a year. People come to be down and say Robin Hood, let us

go to Experience Nottingham. But it has gone. We have heard what the

people want but I am going to speak to the council now to see what they

are going to do about it. It seems that even the Sheriff of Nottingham

is missing Robin at the Nottingham council. They are going to build a

new tourist attraction at the photo of Nottingham Castle which is

expected to bring in half a million tourists to the City a year. You

are talking about recreating a medieval village with half-timbered

buildings and thatch and that kind of thing? Absolutely, as it would

have been. It will be educational and enjoyable. Give me an idea

about what you have planned? Take this road out completely,

completely remove it, until the top of the dates. Remove the college,

because at the end of the day... The whole building? We will find

somewhere else for it to go. We will move down to here and sort of

those buildings that as well. will take 10 years at a cost of �25

million. Suitable external partners are being sought to help maximise

Robin's impact on the city. You did have the Tales of Robin Hood and I

am still following signposts to it but it has been closed by couple of

years now. There was also the World of Robin Hood. They failed. Why

would your village succeed? It will be bigger, better and more in

keeping with what people want. Big projects can succeed if you have

the will and the right package. are in a strange situation of the

Sheriff of Nottingham bringing Robin into the city? Times move on.

I will forgive him for a bit. you think a big tourist attraction

like a medieval village is a positive thing? We need to think

about the creative, the content of the product, rather than the

financial outcome. That is where it is going wrong in this game and age.

-- day and age. We want the world to discover Robin. He is our

greatest assets. Better as hope that this world be the long sought

after at tourist attraction that will last and stun the name of

Robin had back on Nottingham's soil. Interest in the upstairs-downstairs

world of the stately home has never been greater. The National Trust is

no doubt hoping that the success of TV programmes like Downton Abbey

will have a knock-on effect for visitor at numbers one made reopen

after the winter. We have been exploring pastimes of the man who

looks after the clocks at Belton House near Grantham, a place with

Belton House was built to impress. The stately home near Grantham has

lavish gardens, grant Architecture and opulent decor. -- grand

architecture. It has also been host to royalty and the stage for

significant events in history. Who better to take us back in time

family man who looks after the clocks for the National Trust. --

the man who looks after the clocks. At this time of the year, all of

the clocks have to be reset because of the loss of the hour at the end

of October. What this club is able to do is to be set by the sundial

which they have got in the garden. This clop could then be set as the

master time for the rest of the clocks have -- this clock. All of

the other clocks would they be said to this time. Different parts of

the country used to have their own individual time-zones. When they

needed to timetable the first train journeys, an average was taken and

that became known as Greenwich Mean Time. This is meant to impress. The

very height of this clock means that it is looking down on a lot of

people. This clock, although it functions exactly the same as it

was bought, it has witnessed many, many different changes throughout

the 300 odd years that it has been in this property. Belton was a

perfect country-house estate with around 50 indoor servants and 100

rooms. Each room would have had at least one clock and time was the

lubrication that made the whole house run smoothly. We are now in

the Butler's pantry and it was essential that the butler and all

his staff had access to a clock. The sort of club they would have

had here is this clock above the fireplace -- the sort of clock. It

is known as an English dial clock but many know them as school clocks

or railway clerks. It is from here that you would have wind

distributed, food organised, all of the processes of the day and the

entertainments and everything would have been orchestrated from this

whole area and this room in particular. It was truly an

upstairs-downstairs lifestyle for the people here. Their daily

routines were wound tightly by the clock. Now this attic room is

mainly used to store time. This whole floor is given over to the

servants quarters. It is from here of course that the servants would

have descended fire at their own staircase to the basement -- via

their own staircase. They would need to prepare food, light the

fires, open up the rooms, do cleaning, and their day would have

been orchestrated by the clock. At the moment, this area is used as a

store. This provides a relatively stable environment for clocks that

might have been used in different rooms of Belton. Never had so many

people been living at Belton as during the First World War when

170,000 soldiers camped here. It was a war that changed everything,

not least at a grand country houses. The number of servants working in

them dwindled from more than 2 million before the war, to 300,000

afterwards. The numbers never recovered. This is a very ornate

European rococo style. It is very exuberant. It is very, very

different to all of the other clocks. From around 1660, British

noblemen would undertake a rite of passage around Europe called the

grand tour where they would learn about the finest culture in the

world. They would often bring back treasures as examples of what they

had experienced. People of the stature of Lord Brownlow would have

wanted examples of this type of thing to show people that they had

been on the grand tour. This is very typical of the sort of clocks

that you would find in libraries. They were called bracket clocks

because originally they would have sat on a bracket on the wall. What

I need to do now is stop the clock. Lord Brownlow who owned Belton was

a close friend and Lord-in-Waiting to Edward VIII. The king would

visit Belton's garden so much he earned a the nickname Gardener King.

Lord Brownlow would also host some of the hottest social events at

Belton where many members of high society would attend including

Wallis Simpson, the woman Edward VIII chose to abdicate the throne

UCB clocks as something more than timepieces. -- you see the clocks.

Bays are really impressive pieces of technical works apart. --

A few hours ago, I discharged my last duties as King and Emperor.

Now that I have been succeeded by my brother, the Duke of York, my

first words must be to declare my allegiance to him. This I do with

all my heart. You all know the reasons which have impelled me to

renounce the throne. It was possibly hear plans were laid for

what was going to happen after the abdication. As a room, it would

have undoubtedly been witness to what we would regard as momentous

historical events. I want you to know that the decision by have made

has been mined -- has been mine and mine alone. What is interesting

about clocks is that they are handed down from generation to

generation. They're one of the very few old objects that we still use

in exactly the same way that the makers and the original purchasers

would have used them. We hear the same voice that the clock would