A theft a minute: Labour calls on Tories to scrap their Shoplifter’s Charter as new analysis reveals 1,000 shoplifting offences a day while charge rates fall by a quarter
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Shock analysis by the Labour Party has revealed more than 1,000
shoplifting offences are being committed across England and Wales
every day - equating to an offence almost every minute of the day.
Yet separate Freedom of Information requests submitted by the party
to police forces suggest that charges have fallen by a quarter over
the past five years. Shoplifting rose to record highs last year -
up to 402,482 offences in the year ending September 2023, according
to Home...Request free trial
Shock analysis by the Labour Party has revealed more than 1,000 shoplifting offences are being committed across England and Wales every day - equating to an offence almost every minute of the day. Yet separate Freedom of Information requests submitted by the party to police forces suggest that charges have fallen by a quarter over the past five years. Shoplifting rose to record highs last year - up to 402,482 offences in the year ending September 2023, according to Home Office data. That equates to almost 8,000 offences per week, and more than 1,100 offences per day. However, FOI requests show that enforcement against offenders has significantly dropped. Between 2018 and 2023, the proportion of shoplifting offences resulting in a charge across the responding forces fell from 20 per cent to just 15 per cent. Total charges fell from 61,637 to 51,699 - a 14 per cent fall - despite recorded crimes in the 35 forces rising by 16 per cent over the same period. The decline in charges has not been matched by a rise in alternative community penalties, suggesting large numbers of shoplifters are getting off scot-free. Home Office data for the year ending March 2023 shows that only 0.8 per cent of shoplifting offences resulted in an out of court disposal - with 54.5 per cent dropped with no suspect identified. The new data is released to coincide with Labour's National Campaign Day on safer high streets on Saturday. Working with USDAW and The Co-op Party, Labour MPs, mayors, councillors and candidates will be out across the country speaking to local people and businesses about Labour's plans to bring back neighbourhood policing and better support retailers. It comes shortly after the government finally committed to introduce a new offence for assault of a retail worker, which Labour, the Co-op and USDAW have called for, for more than a decade. Since September, Labour has been calling for the Tories to scrap their Shoplifter's Charter, which is leaving criminals to steal with impunity. The rule, brought in by Theresa May in 2014, introduced a new category of ‘low-value shoplifting' to describe theft of goods worth under £200 and has led to police deprioritising enforcement in these cases - even where there are repeat offences or organised shoplifting. This has left businesses and retail workers at the mercy of criminals. Alongside removing the Tories' £200 rule, Labour has vowed to put 13,000 more neighbourhood police and PCSOs back on the streets and introduce a Community Policing Guarantee to tackle shoplifting. Yvette Cooper MP, Labour's Shadow Home Secretary, said: “Under the Tories too many communities and high streets are being blighted by staggering increases in shoplifting, but charge rates are going down. That means more criminals are getting away with it and more local businesses are paying the price. “The Conservative government has decimated neighbourhood policing, leaving our town centres unprotected, and they are still refusing to get rid of the £200 rule, which is encouraging repeat offending and organised gangs of shoplifters. “Labour will scrap the Tories' Shoplifter's Charter and bring in a Community Policing Guarantee, with 13,000 more neighbourhood police and PCSOs to crackdown on shoplifting and keep the public safe.” Shirine Khoury-Haq, CEO of the Co-operative Group, said: “For the last six years, the Co-op has campaigned to tackle retail crime which impacts so heavily on our colleagues, the shops they operate and the communities both serve. “It's critical that police forces up and down the country give tackling retail crime the priority it needs and we are beginning to see a better attendance rate at crimes in our stores; but we need to see further improvement and for that improvement to be maintained. “We welcome the measures proposed in the high streets plan because they will help tackle retail crime and build on the progress the police have made which will protect our colleagues, their shops and their communities.” Ends Notes: FOI requests were fully answered by 35 of the 43 police forces. Recorded shoplifting:
Shoplifting charges:
402,482 shoplifting offences were recorded in the year ending September 2023 - equating to one offence every 1.3 minutes (525,600 minutes in a year) - Home Office data for the year ending March 2023 shows that only 0.8 per cent of shoplifting offences resulted in an out of court disposal - with 54.5% dropped with no suspect identified -Crimeoutcomes in England and Wales 2022 to 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) The Anti-social Behaviour, Crime & Policing Act 2014 brought in a new category of offending for goods under £200, called 'low-value shoplifting' - leading to offences not being pursued. Labour has vowed to scrap this rule - BRC backs Labour's stand on shoplifting to ditch £200 rule - Retail Gazette Labour has pledged to bring in a Community Policing Guarantee -https://labour.org.uk/updates/press-releases/starmer-launches-community-policing-guarantee-to-get-more-police-in-your-town-fighting-antisocial-behaviour-taking-back-our-streets/ Labour's Community Policing Guarantee means:
We'll bring back proper neighbourhood policing by ensuring every part of the country has more local officers and PCSOs, and guaranteed town centre patrols with tougher powers. We'll give every community a named officer they can get in touch with, so policing gets back to what it's supposed to do.
Getting tough with those who blight our towns, with new powers to ban repeat offenders from town centres and stamp out public drinking and drug use. Every local area will have a dedicated lead focused specifically on tackling anti-social behaviour.
We will give local people and businesses a say in how their local area and town centre is policed, ensuring the police work with them on deciding priorities.
We will ensure that the path to career progression in policing is through getting to know your community – and ensure all neighbourhood officers are properly trained to be problem-solvers, not just recorders of crime. We will also work with the College of Policing and police chiefs to ensure neighbourhood policing has access to cutting edge technology and methods, including data analytics and hotspot policing. |