A crackdown on shoplifting is expected to be announced in the King’s Speech on Wednesday.
The government is due to unveil a new crime bill to target people who steal goods worth less than £200.
The policy would be a reversal of 2014 legislation that meant “low-value” thefts worth under £200 were subject to less serious punishment.
The government is also expected to introduce a specific offence of assaulting a shop worker to its legislative agenda.
It will not be clear until legislation passes through Parliament what the punishments for any new or strengthened offences would be.
Data from the Office for National Statistics shows that last year was the worst on record for shoplifting in England and Wales.
Police recorded over 430,000 offences in those nations in 2023 – though retailers say underreporting means these figures are likely to represent only a fraction of the true number of incidents.
Michelle Whitehead, who works at a convenience store in Wolverhampton, said her shop had been “hit every day” by thieves.
People were stealing “absolutely anything” including “tins of spam, tins of corned beef, all the fresh meat”, Ms Whitehead told BBC Radio 4’s World at One programme.
“They’re just coming in, getting their whole arm and sweeping the lot off the shelves,” she said. “The shelves were always empty.”
She said she believed “organised” criminal gangs, rather than individuals struggling with the cost of living, were behind the thefts in her shop.
The crackdown on “low-value” shoplifting “will help a lot of little shops,” Ms Whitehead said.
While retailers and shop workers have welcomed the anticipated proposals, a civil liberties group has raised concerns about criminalising people struggling to make ends meet and overburdening the prison system.
The new legal measures are expected to be announced as part of the King’s Speech on Wednesday, a key piece of the State Opening of Parliament that allows the government to outline its priorities over the coming months.
Before the general election, the Labour Party pledged to reverse what it described as the “shoplifter’s charter” – a piece of 2014 legislation that reduced the criminal punishment for “low-value shoplifting”.
Tom Holder, spokesperson for the British Retail Consortium (BRC), told BBC News the impact of the 2014 legislation has been to “deprioritise it in the eyes of police”.
“I think police would be less likely to turn up to what they see as low-level theft,” he said.
Shoplifting cost retailers £1.8 billion in the last year, which could impact prices, according to the BRC.
“Shoplifting harms everyone in that sense – those costs eventually get made up somewhere, whether it’s prices going up or other prices that can’t come down,” Mr Holder said.
Co-op campaigns and public affairs director Paul Gerrard said the supermarket chain had also recorded rising theft and violence against shop workers.
“There’s always been people who will steal to make ends meet. That’s not what is behind the rise we’ve seen,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Tuesday. “What’s behind that rise is individuals and gangs targeting large volumes of stock in stores for resale in illicit venues like pubs, clubs, markets, and out the back of cars.”
But Jodie Beck, policy and campaigns officer at civil liberties organisation Liberty, had concerns about the expected proposals, saying there is “already a wide range of powers” the police can use to tackle shoplifting and anti-social behaviour levelled at retail staff.
Ms Beck said the “£200 threshold” would not just target criminal gangs but also “people who are pushed into the desperate situation of not paying for things” because they cannot afford to make ends meet.
She urged the government to avoid focusing on “criminal justice and policing solutions instead of doing the thoughtful work of looking at the root causes of crime, which we believe are related to poverty and inequality”.
Ms Beck also argued the additional legislation could serve to worsen the UK’s “enormous court backlog” and its “bursting prison system”.
Last week, Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood announced plans to release thousands of prisoners early to ease overcrowding in the country’s prisons.
A spokesperson for Downing Street said the government would not comment on the King’s Speech until it has been delivered by the monarch.
A National Police Chiefs’ Council spokesperson said the organisation had worked with the government last year to develop the Retail Crime Action Plan, to reduce commercial theft.
The plan involves treating shoplifting as organised crime.
“Police forces have embedded the plan in their operational work and we’re already seeing positive results,” they added.
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