A BUSINESSMAN who used his plant hire firm as a cover for a bootleg booze operation has been ordered to hand over £50,000 of his illegal profits.

The move follows ground-breaking court action against Ribble Valley company boss Eric Dugdale, brought by Customs and Excise officials five months after he was jailed for a year for evading duty.

East Lancashire bootleggers have now been warned that they will be forced to hand over profits from the illegal trade when they are bought to justice.

Dugdale, 62, of Calder Farm, Bolton-by-Bowland, was jailed at Preston Crown Court last September after he admitted dealing in bootleg booze from his plant hire business.

Customs and Excise investigators had mounted a surveillance operation on Dugdale's E and D Plant Hire business on Pendle Trading Estate, Chatburn. Crates and whisky, rum, brandy, vodka and gin were seized from the business premises and Dugdale's farmhouse and he admitted evading duty of £52,037.

The Ribble Valley businessman was described as a respectable businessman whose life had been shattered by the court case. Yesterday, Customs and Excise fraud investigators based in Blackburn became the first in the North West to successfully apply for an order to recoup the excise duty which Dugdale had avoided paying.

Dugdale, who is due to be released from prison next month, was ordered to pay more than £48,460 within 28 days when he appeared at Preston Crown Court for the hearing.

The money is the amount solicitors estimated he benefited from through the illegal trade.

Fred Simmons, the manager of the investigation unit, revealed the hearing was the first of its kind in the North of England but similar cases are set to follow.

He said: "It is Government policy to get tough with people who take part in this illegal trade.

"We will ensure that people do not gain from this illegal trade."

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