Black market cigarettes have been taken off the streets with the help of detection dogs Alfie and Indy.

Islington Council’s trading standards team took 820 Marlboro branded cigarettes and 2.4kg of rolling tobacco from premises in Essex Road and Seven Sisters Road.

Further action will now be taken against both shop owners.

In October, as reported in the Gazette, a house in Tottenham was raided after a trading standards officer saw a woman attempting to sell tobacco from a shopping trolley in Holloway.

More than 16,000 illicit Chinese cigarettes, and almost 12kg of loose leaf tobacco, were seized as part of that raid.

Cllr Paul Convery, Islington’s executive member for community safety, said: “All tobacco is harmful, but the illegal tobacco market – and in particular the availability of cheap cigarettes – make it harder for smokers to quit and remain smoke free.

“Our trading standards officers are working hard to keep these illegal products off the streets and are cracking down on the businesses and individuals that flout the law.”

Cllr Convery added: “The illicit tobacco trade is controlled by organised crime and is therefore connected with the violent world of drugs, prostitution and people trafficking.

“Anyone buying smuggled tobacco is helping to fund these other crimes.”

The latest tobacco operation was part of a wider series of raids across nine regions in England, coordinated with the Chartered Trading Standards Institute.