Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate her Department has made of the cost of retail crime to the UK economy in 2017; and what steps her Department is taking to tackle retail crime.

The Government recognises the impact that retail crime has on businesses. The British Retail Consortium, for example, estimated that the direct financial cost of crime to the UK retail industry was £660 million in 2015-16. We do not yet have data for the estimated cost of retail crime to the UK retail industry in 2017.

We work closely with the retail sector through the National Retail Crime Steering Group, which brings together representatives from industry, Government and the Police. This includes the British Retail Consortium and the Association of Convenience Stores to understand better the crime issues that affect the sector and how we can best work together to prevent and respond to these crimes.