Crown Agents’ Team Leader in Bulgaria
JOHN BROWN: NOT EVERYONE IS CORRUPT

12th of September 2009

“Capital” Weekly
by Mrs. Vera Denizova

The recommendations, which you have made to the previous Governments and which have not been implemented so fat, are over 250. Why are they so many?

These 250 recommendations have been made in the past two and a half years and this is the total number of all recommendations under our current project. They are at various stages of implementation and are not particularly to customs but state tax, other financial areas, MoF IT section, etc. A number of these recommendations are in the process of being implemented now. An example would be the use of risk analysis in the activities of the NRA and the NCA. In the rest of the European community customs checks are selective. We are trying to promote this practice in Bulgaria. You can not check every cargo or every individual coming into this country.

Why the reports and the contract of Crown Agents with the Bulgarian Government are secret?

I wasn’t here initially when the decisions were made. But in normal commercial life there are confidential areas.

It is clear that not everything can be “on display”. But when the state spends taxpayers’ money it is logical that they will want to know whether this is effective.

In my time in charge here I am very satisfied with the product that we have given the Bulgarian Government, whichever Government has been in power. But I have not been here for the whole period, because I left in 2005 and came back in the end of 2007.

What has changed in Bulgarian Customs since Crown Agents became advisors to Bulgaria?

There have been improvements, for instance the concept of the mobile teams. A number of guidance on the staff work have been drawn up. Risk analysis has been introduced, the customs intelligence has improved. But I’d like to remind you that we started from scratch in many of these areas.

What’s your assessment of the current work of the Bulgarian customs?

Very good. The work is good and it is comparable to the other EU countries. In the years I have been working in Bulgaria, I have noticed that there is a tendency of self-criticism. The picture is not that as bad in Bulgaria as it is presented. I have been to other EU countries in which some things are worse than in Bulgaria.

However the people have the impression that the mobile teams do not work as it is expected of them. Why is that?

As far as I know, the results of the mobile teams’ work are not published. Our advisors are no longer in the teams, our job is to advise them.

Why the results are still not good since the problematic sectors are known from the excise perspective?

A few years ago the excise administration was transferred from the National Revenue Agency to the Customs. However, not all NRA staff wanted to be transferred to the customs administration so some of the people working in the excise sphere haven’t had much experience.

Why the Bulgarian revenue administration couldn’t smash the corruption so many years?

Not everyone is corrupt. After all, it takes two parties to have corruption. If the business happens to be asked a pay-off, they should complain immediately. Then the system should react and the corrupted official investigated. There will always be a certain number of corrupted officials everywhere around the world. But the most part of the public administration is honest. What can be done is to curb the conditions to be corrupted. There are hotlines for corruption signals in the NRA and the Customs. So instead of just speaking everyone should complain - the systems have been created to be used and if it turns that they do not work then you should start making very big noise about this.