Highlights
- Funding and policing boost shoplifting arrests .
- Offences hit record high, more incidents reported .
- Retailers face mounting losses despite efforts .
Police continue to remain under-resourced to respond to every shoplifting case, despite new hotspot funding providing extra overtime hours, a police and crime commissioner (PCC) has said, though assuring that tackling shoplifting in UK remains a priority.
Avon and Somerset PCC Clare Moody stated that more help was now available to businesses to help tackle shoplifting and there had been more arrests in the past year due to shopkeepers being able to provide CCTV and video evidence.
Speaking to BBC Radio Bristol on Friday (Aug 29), she said, "We are under resourced in policing.
"We haven't got sufficient numbers still to be able to respond to all of these shoplifting cases [but] it is a priority. We have got hotspot funding [extra government money] now so we've got additional overtime hours that have been happening."
Moody added that there had been a successful focus on dealing more effectively with repeat shoplifting offenders but that the force needed to get better at communicating those successes to the public.
When asked why recorded crime had risen in 2024- 2025, compared to the two years prior, Moody said an increase in reporting had been a factor.
"Sometimes crime statistics going up is actually a positive indicator because there is more confidence to report," she said.
"It's about how the police respond. It's about making sure the victim is at the centre of that response but the policing focus is on the perpetrator."
Meanwhile, shoplifting offences in England and Wales hit a two-decade high in July, with many convenience retailers pointing out that the true picture is much worse as millions of shoplifting incidents are not reported to the police.
The Office for National Statistics said it had recorded 530,643 offences, the highest figure since current police recording practices began in 2003. In the previous year to March 2024 there were 444,022 offences, an annual rise of 30 per cent.
The ONS did not give reasons for the rise, but said it continued a trend that set in at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
Labour government has pledged to address the rise in retail crime through stronger measures to tackle shoplifting and anti-social behaviour.
According to retail body British Retail Consortium, more than 20 million incidents of theft were committed in the year to August 2024, equating to 55,000 a day, costing retailers 2.2 billion pounds.