PRESS ASSOCIATION -- The Government is setting out plans for a new push against organised crime, while cutting the costs of policing.
The Organised Crime Strategy is intended to ensure there is a co-ordinated national approach to the issue across government, law enforcement, and the security and intelligence agencies.
At the same time, ministers say the strategy is designed to reduce the costs of tackling a problem which is estimated to cost the UK between £20 billion and £40 billion each year.
It will pave the way for the creation in 2103 of the new National Crime Agency, which will replace the Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) and the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, as well as housing the national cyber crime unit and covering border policing and economic crime.
Soca was criticised by MPs in 2009 after it was disclosed that it managed to recover just £1 from criminals for every £15 of public money spent.
Home Office minister James Brokenshire said: "The Organised Crime Strategy will bring a new emphasis on the prevention of organised crime alongside a greater push to ensure that more prosecution and disruption activity takes place against more organised criminals, at a reduced cost."
The Government believes around 38,000 people are involved in organised crime in the UK, as part of 6,000 criminal gangs. It said about half of of those are involved in drugs, while gangsters also use human trafficking, fraud and money laundering.
Mr Brokenshire said he wants to crack down on the "dodgy accountants and bent lawyers" who make it easier for criminals to ply their trade and look into "front companies" by working with the tax authorities and insolvency authorities.
At a time when Government departments are cutting their spending, the National Crime Agency is designed to save money, the minister said.
"At the moment the Border Agency, the Serious Organised Crime Agency and Revenue and Customs are spending as much as £829 million each year dealing with organised crime," said Mr Brokenshire. "We believe that would be more effective if we join together, if we actually coordinate this more effectively."