Introduction to the Verbal Reasoning Measure

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A.

Customs officers crack £111m mobile

VAT fraud

A joint operation between British and German customs officers (1) _________________ (to disrupt) a £111m “carousel” fraud this week. Carousel fraud works when small, high-value goods such as mobile phones (2) ______________ (to import) VAT-free into an EU country. Then they (3) ___________________ (to sell) with the VAT added but the tax never (4) _________________ (to hand) to the government. They then (5) _____ (to re-export) and the VAT, which never (6) ______________ (to pay) at the beginning of the chain, (7) ___________________ (to reclaim).

To disrupt the scam, British customs officers (8) _____________ (to work) with their German counterparts on the Swiss-German border. They (9) __________________ (to stop) trucks and (10) _________________ (to scan) mobile phones. They (11) ______________ (to track) phones by their serial numbers to spot cross-border fraud. Since the cross-border operation (12) _______________ (to be) under way, officers (13) _______________ (to operate) at Frankfurt airport intercepting air shipments. The serial numbers (14) _________________________ (to scan, record and compare) with others to pick up evidence of fraud. Officers (15) ______________ (to alert) when the same phones (16) ___________________ (to detect) twice in a single week crossing in the same direction. Investigators across Europe (17) ____________________ (to step up) their operations against VAT fraud in the past year as the European Commission (18) _______________ (to establish) the fraud could cost the EU governments €50bn a year.

(From ‘The Guardian’, abridged)

B.

Why you should worry if your child watches

TV for 8 hours a week

Healthcare experts who (1) ______________ (to study) children’s health for the past few years (2) _____________________ (to come up) with eight warning signs that can pinpoint the three-year-olds who are likely to have serious health problems even before they (3) ___________________ (to leave) primary school. Some of the factors long (4) ___________________ (to be) obvious, such as substantial weight gain. But there are items that may give many parents pause. The doctors say that the three-year-olds who (5) ______________ (to watch) more than 8 hours of television a week are at an increased risk of obesity and, later, diabetes.

John Reily and his team at the University of Glasgow (6) ______________ (to study) 8,000 children aged seven. Since they (7) ________________ (to be) on the project they (8) __________________ (to acquire) the following data. Television viewing (9) _________________ (to increase) obesity risk since children (10) _____________________ (to tend) to eat in front of the TV set. Dr Reily says his team’s work with preschool children suggests that parents (11) ________________ (not to realize) how inactive their children are. “They have the impression that their children constantly (12) _____________ (to rush) about. We (13) ___________________ (to do) a lot of measures and it is quite obvious that they are always on the go in mental sense,” he said. Junk food is also a problem and it is difficult for parents to remember what their children (14) __________________ (to eat) lately, he said.

It was the first time this kind of research (15) __________________ (to carry out). The scientists concluded that the problem (16) ____________________ (to tackle) only after parents (17) _________________ (to change) their children’s life patterns.

(From ‘The Guardian’, abridged)

C.

A man suffering from paranoid schizophrenia (1) _____________ (to convict) yesterday of stabbing a police officer, DC Michael Swindells, to death as the officer tried to arrest him. Glaister Butler, 49, formally (2) _______________ (to clear) of murder after the prosecution accepted that medical evidence showed he (3) ________________ (to suffer) an abnormality of mind for years.

During the trial, the jury (4) ___________________ (to read) Butler’s medical notes which revealed he (5) _____________________ (to believe) he (6) ___________________ (to be) the victim of conspiracy by MI5, the police and the authorities.

On the day he (7) __________________ (to kill), Mr Swindells (8) _____________ (to attempt) with other officers to arrest Butler who (9) ______________________ (to threaten) a local carpenter with a knife. Butler (10) __________________ (not to take) his medication, and the court heard that being confronted by a number of police officers probably “tipped him over the edge.”

The mental problems of the Jamaican-born mechanical engineer started when he (11) ________________ (to make) redundant from his job with the Rolls-Royce in 1989 though he (12) ____________________ (to work) for the company for 8 years and always (13) _________________ (to hold) in high esteem.

It emerged during the trial that he (14) ________________ (to believe) the police (15) __________________ (to be) responsible for him losing the job. He first came to the attention of social services in 1996 when they (16) _________________ (to tell) that he (17) __________________ (to live) without electricity for two years. In 1998 he kicked a neighbour in the head in an unprovoked attack and during the investigation it emerged that he (18) ___________________ (to abuse) his neighbours and (19) _______________ (to shout): “They (20) ________________ (to persecute) me.”

(From ‘The Guardian’, abridged)

Grammar in Speech