Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) reports of, (b) charges for and (c) convictions for shoplifting there were in (i) Basingstoke constituency and (ii) Hampshire in each year since 2010.

The Home Office collects and publishes information on the number of shoplifting offences and their investigative outcomes recorded by the police in England and Wales on a quarterly basis.

The proportion of shoplifting offences, broken down by Police Force Area, including Hampshire, which resulted in a “Charge/Summonsed” outcome can be derived from the Outcomes Open Data tables, which can be accessed here:https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/police-recorded-crime-open-data-tables

Information at the Parliamentary Constituency level is not held by the Home Office.

The Ministry of Justice publish statistics on convictions at courts in England and Wales, including a breakdown of convictions at courts in the Hampshire police force area. These are available in the Outcomes by Offence data tool that can be accessed here:https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/criminal-justice-system-statistics-quarterly-december-2023

In the last year of the previous government shoplifting soared to a twenty-year high.

This Government will end the effective immunity, introduced by the previous Government, granted to shop theft of goods under £200 and we will introduce a standalone offence of assaulting a shopworker, so everybody can feel safe at work.