30/01/2012 Inside Out West Midlands

Hello and welcome to inside dealt with stories you need to know from

across the Midlands. Continuing protests against higher

university fees as figures released today suggest more than 40,000

people have decided not to apply to study this year.

Also in the programme, the volunteers trying to restore a

canal between the Severn and the Thames.

But first we investigate the bootleg booze are being sold on a

street near you. In it is shocking that somebody is telling that to

people. They do not care. Racily police in Birmingham

arrested a group of men suspected of making and supplying illegal

alcohol. Before that, five men were killed in an explosion at an

illegal factory in Lincolnshire putting bootleg booze family on the

map. Do you know what you're drinking and what harm it might be

News overnight that five men had been killed in an explosion in

Boston in Lincolnshire. How does it look? There is Police tape.

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 Boston blast open the public's are

raised to this highly dangerous scam. It is often really hard to

tell the difference between the fake, like this seized at a bootleg

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

fatal. The fake brands disguise a little -- lethal blend of can cause.

They do not care for anyone. They only care about lining their own

pockets. The criminal gangs cost the taxpayer a billion pounds a

year by failing to pay alcohol duty. Vodka is the easiest Biarritz to

copy. You can make it on Monday and sell it on Tuesday. But it is the

drinkers that pay the highest price, sometimes with their eyesight.

feel lucky to be alive. I did not think I would be able to get out of

bed ever again. Hidden in a remote corner of Leicestershire, one

organised gang of bootleggers went undetected until undercover Customs

officers tracked them down to a rented unit. They were making fake

vodka or at a place already known It was a wonderful feeling to know

we had cracked it. There is someone messing around with the palette at

the back. We have identified which building it is. They are not paying

it any attention to us. We will go in nice and steady. 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 is enough methylated spirit to produce

100,000 bottles of fake vodka. had a tank, a tank that cold --

held the finished product before dropping it down to a bottling line.

We had a commercial capping machine which put the counterfeit caps on

the bottles. It then passed down the conveyor belt to a labelling

machine which that the labels on. I had visited thousands of spirit

bottling plants all over the world and I had never seen anything like

this. Absolutely horrendous. Could have been a disaster in the making.

Ed Binstead is a spirits industry safety expert. His evidence

revealed how a simple spark could ignite alcohol vapours, triggering

a major explosion. This was a time bomb. Look at what happened in

Boston. These places popping up all over the UK at the moment. The gang

of six has been sentenced to more than 20 years in jail. The

mastermind was Kevin Eddie Shaw. His right-hand man was John

Humphrys but the Chemist, the man who knew how to add beach to meths

so it looked like vodka was this man from Poland. The counterfeiters

had done a very good job at forging the bottles on to the labels. The

bottles were sourced from a genuine brand supplier and the labels had

been sourced from Poland. So the product look like the real thing.

Counterfeit alcohol is now being seized across the country daily. It

is a top priority for trading standards. We seized these from

different parts of the county. problem is they can train

industrial alcohol. These are the type of products you want to keep

out of harm's way, cleaning fluids, paint strippers, not something you

would want to be drinking. We are aware that somebody did die from

drinking counterfeit alcohol. recent survey, almost 60 % of off-

licences in Coventry sought illegal spirits. Across the whole of

Staffordshire, out of more than 400 licensed stores, one in five sold

counterfeit Biarritz generally fake vodka. The if we are talking about

the production, the sale and avoidance of exercised duty, we are

talking about a multi-million pound business and they would not be

surprised if there is still an illegal operating in the East

Midlands. People should regarded with alarm and be aware this is

going on because the bargains they perceive these drinks are may not

be the bargains they think they are. They could end up will. Students

are on the lookout for cheap vodka. Lauren from Derbyshire bought what

she now knows to be a bogus bound for �5.99. The man in the love

licence joked, it would blind her. Two months on, he was not far wrong.

I was growing up, I could not keep anything down. This lasted for two

days. I was not able to get out of bed. The second day I just thought,

am I ever going to feel better? I could not feel very well. My vision

was blurred. I tend to lose my peripheral vision quite a lot.

Crossing the road can be difficult. It is really scary. When you cannot

see anything, when you're driving, even walking down the street, it is

scary. Cash of two departments are starting to see more patients who

think they have done a vodka or but it is really chemicals contained in

industrial alcohol. There are drinking the same amount of alcohol

they normally drink but they are getting more intense symptoms,

thinking they may have had their drinks spiked. The symptoms are

severe, abdominal pain, nausea so, intense vomiting and also visual

problems. The problem with interesting stuff like this is it

attacks the optic nerve and can cause permanent blindness. The

optic nerve that -- runs from behind the eye and if that gets

rolling, it can cause blindness. Near Moscow farm, the pub landlady

is shocked at the ticking time bomb which was on their doorstep but can

she tell the difference between a fake from the factory and the will

bottle? No, I cannot believe it. It is exactly the same. Are you amazed

at how good they are? Shock. There is one simple error - before just

put the wrong figure of 28 units. Much of the Moscow farm fake could

still be up there, along with thousands of other dangers bogus

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

bootleggers posts. Be experienced industry has to stay one step ahead

of the bootlegger, not only to protect their brand but to protect

the public. It is custom officers who face the challenge of seeking

out these highly organised criminals. It is crucial that we

find these places, take them out and dismantle them so that they

cannot be used over again. The UK's consumption of real vodka has risen

considerably over the past 10 years as drinkers seek out cheap booze,

the bootleggers are leaving a lethal legacy. Pity shocking that

somebody is selling that two people. They do not care.

If it is still happening now, the problems with my vision, I assume

it is here from good and it is all It is the day we learned how many

young people have applied to university. Despite the new higher

fees. The controversy has not gone away. A recent report suggested

that most students will not ever earn enough to pay back their loans,

leaving the government with a massive bill. In many universities,

the protests continue. Figures released today by the

University Admissions Service show the number of students applying for

a place this year has fallen by nearly 9%. Some say this is due to

the rise in tuition fees. You may have thought the battle over these

was lost but there is still some lively protests going on around the

country and here in the Midlands. An occupation at the University of

Birmingham. When students took over an abandoned building on campus,

security moved in as fellow- students tried to join the protest

or deliver supplies which they claimed was being blocked. The

students filmed what happened next. Meet Hattie, we asked her to

explain why she was protesting. disagree with the changes happening

in higher education at the moment. We are angry that they have tripled

the amount universities can now charge. Why students are worrying

about starting their lives with so much debt, some economists are

arguing that actually the government will end up spending

more through the new system than the old. A report by investment

managers says only graduates with the starting salary of �50,000 will

pay back their loans in full. With salaries like that out of reach for

most, it is predicted that in 30 years, the country will face a

massive bill as unpaid loans are written off. If you are not

employed you do not pay. If after 30 years there is an amount

outstanding, you have nothing else to pay off. I am not surprised that

students are protesting in terms of the increase in fees but I am not

sure it has been presented to them effectively. Back in Birmingham, to

stop the obligation -- the university paid for a High Court

injunction that meant that the students had to leave or face

The injunction bans all occupations on campus for the next 12 months.

With students facing fines or rest if they carry on. This move by the

university has been criticised with Amnesty International saying this

could have a chilling effect on the legitimate exercise of fundamental

human rights. And there should not be a group -- used as an excuse to

prevent protests which are merely inconvenient or embarrassing. The

Vice Chancellor of the Ministry of Birmingham, who turned down a

request for a interview, denies he is trying to suppress protests and

in a statement, said the investor got the injunction because the

building was unsafe for that number of people and because of social

networks statements suggesting further occupation be going to

happen. -- Chancellor of the University of Birmingham. But

Nottingham University, the main author of a it alternative... Is

highly critical of Birmingham's Vice-Chancellor. I think it is very

unfortunate and rather heavy-handed because the students want to engage

in protest omen of the reasons is they are engaged and lively and

people. What they were doing by occupier was not simply setting in

but creating a space for debate. What do people away from the

corridors of learning think? His university a privileged students

should have to pay for? Will the new fees saddled students with

unreasonable debt? Have got a nephew who has been through it off.

He's got his doctorate degree and he cannot get a job. I have a

grandson who went to university and the first thing they did when they

got there was to take them on an almighty booze-up. If you half the

drive and desire, you don't need it. If you want something, you will

make it happen. You will not need anyone to open doors for you.

you recommend university to the people? No. The education minister

David Willetts, himself no stranger to these... His family comes from

the city and his great-grandfather was a glazier who helped install

the scale Glass -- stained glass windows in the Great Hall. What

does he make of the continuing demonstrations? I say to the

students, and I enjoy meeting the students, especially students from

the River City of Birmingham, coming from Birmingham and with

many family ties, I say to them this is a fair way of funding

education and it will ensure universities like Birmingham are

well financed in the future. It's in the interests of your but how

financially strong universities -- interests of young people to have

financially strong universities. That is what we are paying for. It

is in your long-term interest. If you are a well paid graduate you,

you pay back. If you are not in a well-paid job, you don't. Meanwhile,

at the University of Birmingham, the students remain determined to

be heard. They call them next tactic a jogupation. The idea is to

jog around the campus and through buildings, to see how a security

reactors, to illustrate the ridiculousness of the fact that

universities security are employed to chose their own students. -- but

Some students have criticised the protests carried out by a minority

as disruptive and pointless but academics who argue that a --

higher education should be publicly funded have not shifted onto

students, believe Birmingham's vice chancellor is actively trying to

suppress debate. He has recently argued in the Guardian newspaper

that in fact public display it is unfortunate and important policy

areas like education ought to be resolved by senior civil servants

and ministers, behind closed doors. While he would not comment, it is

alleged that even the Vice Chancellor of the University of

Birmingham, who sat on the Brown revue which came up with the higher

fees, does not believe the new scheme is sustainable. In at the

longer term, it will not save money, it will cost more money. You are

saying the government has got it wrong. But the government will not

admit that. No government ever wants to admit that. Governments

aren't come -- prepared to do it and that is why opposition debate

is important. If governments do get it wrong, the people who pay our

the public, not the government. latest move that Birmingham led to

a sit in outside the Vice- Chancellor's office. A we went to

show them that despite the fact they had this injunction, it wasn't

going to stop us from continuing with peaceful process -- protest on

campus. Students across the country say they will continue to fight the

fees on behalf of younger generations. Further protests are

being planned that will mean people from all over the country come to

the Birmingham campus next month to campaign against the injunction and

the increased fees. Public interest lawyers are now representing the

students and have demanded the injunction be removed immediately.

They say it represents an unexpected of restriction on the

students with legitimate right to protest. The university says it is

planning more formal debate around the fees. Despite the drop in

applications, David Willetts insists the new system is fair.

Let's be clear, if people don't been more than �21,000 a year, they

don't pay back and that is quite right. That is the design of the

system. Who picks up the tab? taxpayer picks up the tab if people

don't earn more than �21,000 a year. We reckon that roughly for every

�1,000 Mill End, we get �700 back because the graduates of buy in

large in well-paid jobs. But if you are not in a so much, you don't pay

back and that is a deliberate feature of the system. That is why

people should not worry. For the 44,002 did worry, economists say

invested in education still pays off. Should the government have

left things unchanged? There are pros and cons. The fact of the

matter is those kids looking at going to university have

information about tells them there is a spectacular advantage in going

to university based on salary and life experience. Take it.

What do you think? You can join in Our final story to write is about

an ambitious project to restore a canal in the Cotswolds. The water

we would run from the River Severn to the Thames. It would link

England's two longest rivers. But not everyone is happy about the

These boats are preparing for a journey from here to the River

Thames. It should be a leisurely cruise of 36 miles across the

Cotswolds canal which link the two places but there is a problem. It

is quite simple. This whole business of canals is really about

getting from A to B by boat. Or in this case, from Saul, about a

quarter of a mile that we, too that bridge. -- that way. We're never

But that low bridges are read the first obstacle blocking the

Cotswold canals. When they opened it and 1789, there revolutionised

transport for Stroud's mail industry by linking or Severn river

with the Thames. But inevitably, the canals and they -- fell victim

to the success of the railways and were abandoned. The last time a

boat carrying cargo bit Virginia wrong this canal to Lech Laide was

in 1911. That was 100 years ago. Back then, that journey took about

three days. Now, whichever way you go, it will take considerably

longer. We're going to take three weeks on that crews, there is a

huge difference, and we are highlighting the fact the canal is

being restored, to raise money. your marks, get set, Go! It will

open up a nice, new cruising route. Instead of going on a dangerous

route to Bristol, it means we will be able to go all the way to Tower

Bridge. I will be catching up with the boats later but in the meantime,

I want to find out a bit more about the restoration project. There are

6000 members of the Cotswold canals Trust and every week, about 200

volunteers put in some hard graft. What makes you volunteer and do

this? I have lived here for 50 years and in 20 years, I would like

to see it all finished. That would be a good goal. At the moment, I'm

looking for work and this is a valuable thing to do for one's own

personal self-esteem. Restoration is well under way between us all

and Stroud. That section is going to cost about �25 million and

should be completed in three years. The idea is in the future, boats

will be able to cruise through places like this village where the

canal has been brought back to its former glory. But it is not all

plain sailing. Some sections of the canal beyond Stroud lie on private

property and it will take a lot of work and some persuasion to restore

the waterway. Just behind you hear is the sight of the old canal. This

is what they are proposing to dredge and for use again. It sounds

like a good idea. Does it sound like a good idea to do? No, it's us

like bloody rubbish. Anybody with sense would soon come to that

decision. The canal over and there is the River Thames. Why do you

want to have these two waterways? It means cutting my from Imhoff and

it makes me from an operation more difficult. The money side of it is

horrendous. All the district councils, who were queuing up to

support the restoration before, apart from Stroud, are now worrying

about the money. Stroud District Council is the lead partner in the

restoration project. Can it justify this huge spent? What do you say to

people who say could you not have spent money on something else?

can always spend money on something else but this is part of our

heritage and our past. We also think we are building something for

the future. We felt this would be good for Stroud, the town and the

district. It will attract more people to come here. It would be

something in the leisure industry but also along this corridor, we

would like to see it regeneration of both the industrial side, light

engineering, the sort of stuff you see in these areas, along with some

new residential, waterside living. People are naturally attracted to

water, whether it is sea, canals, rivers, or whatever. But the cost

is just one aspect that affects some of those troubled by this

restoration. Another disused section of the canal runs through

this garden in Frampton Mansell, east of Stroud. For water levels

are very, very low. -- the water. In the summer, when people want to

have their leisure pursuits, and in the winter we get probably too much

water. We are very grateful to the empty canal because it is a very

good flood defence. But keeping water in the canal was always a

huge Channel Court -- a challenge, even in its heyday. I've come to

their tunnel, at the highest point along the route, to find out how

they are going to manage. We us standing on a quagmire at the

moment but in cannot terms, this is as dry as it gets. How on earth do

you go about getting water back into this thing? This is the eight-

mile long... It supplies the whole canal. Water will have to be pumped

him either from reservoirs or from lower down the canal where water

availability is less of a problem. In addition to that, there is the

potential for the canal to be used for transferring build water

supplies from the Severn River area across to the Thames area to

relieve shortages in the south-east. If that was to come off, the amount

of water that would be needed for the boat traffic would be almost

inconsequential compared with that the work would be available. At the

far end of the canal, here, yet more volunteers are busy restoring

one of the 56 locks and it is the place where the canal finally meets

the River Thames. So, 36 miles back that way, along the canal, is were

restarted three weeks ago. -- where we started. It is the final

destination for the narrowboats after their epic journey. That

means just one thing. Hello! We'll go to desperately turnaround -- we

are going to desperately turn around. A everything about narrow

boating is slow. I guess that is its appeal. Let's hope it will not

be another hundred years before these birds can take the short cut

home along at the restored That is it for tonight but if

you've got a story, or you'd like to let me know your thoughts on

tonight's programme, drop me any male. -- drop me an email. See you

next time. Next time, we follow a policeman

who cycles to work who captures on- camera dangerous road use. People