Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps the National Retail Crime Steering Group has taken to tackle violence in the retail sector.

Any act of violence or abuse against retail staff is a serious matter which is why tackling it is the number one priority issue for the National Retail Crime Steering Group, which I co-chair with the British Retail Consortium.

Through this group, we have developed a Violence Reduction Strategy which includes activities to increase reporting of violence and abuse, develop a framework for effective preventative training for retail staff and private security, work with PCCs to raise the priority of this crime type in their policing plans and work with wider Criminal Justice stakeholders to ensure that sentencing guidelines and aggravating thresholds are appropriate.