A parliamentary committee on shop theft has come out in support of making assaults on retail workers a standalone offence.
The Justice and Home Affairs Committee’s inquiry into shop theft estimated that there are around 17 million such incidents every year, but crimes are so widely under-reported that they are having a “devastating impact” on the sector and its workforce.
Only 443,000 incidents were recorded by police in the year to March 2024, but while this was the highest since records began 20 years ago, the committee said this was likely a “drop in the ocean”.
The committee published a letter to the minister for policing, crime and fire prevention, Dame Diana Johnson, saying: “The nature of the offence has evolved from individualised offending to relentless, large-scale, organised operations accompanied by unprecedented levels of violence.
Retail workers
“Shop theft is now seen as a lucrative profit-making opportunity which is being exploited by organised criminal networks.”
The committee said it welcomed a new national scheme called Pegasus which aims to tackle organised crime in the retail sector.
It also stressed its support for the creation of a standalone offence of assaulting a retail worker. The government put forward amendments to the Crime and Policing Bill in the King’s Speech in July, proposing the new specific offence.
It is already a specific offence in Scotland under the Protection of Workers (Retail and Age-restricted Goods and Services Act), which came into force in 2021.
The committee made a number of further recommendations to government, including phasing out the use of the term “shoplifting” as it feels this trivialises the severity of the offence; developing improved reporting systems so staff can report crime quickly and easily; and introducing best practice guidance for the use of facial recognition technology.
A number of retailers already equip staff with bodycams after reporting an increase in violent crime against their staff.
A spokesperson for the Home Office said: “We are taking immediate action through our commitment to scrap the £200 shop theft threshold, and making assaults on shop workers a criminal offence.
“We will also put thousands more dedicated police officers on our streets, and establish a Retail Crime Forum for retailers to confidently implement tactics against shop theft.”
Lord Foster of Bath, chair of the Justice and Home Affairs Committee, said: “The scale of the shop theft problem within England and Wales is totally unacceptable and action, like that underway in the Pegasus scheme, is vital and urgent.
“There’s no silver bullet. But, if adopted, the recommendations in our report should help tackle the problem and help keep the public and our economy safer.”
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