Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to increase deterrents for shoplifting.

Shoplifting continues to increase at an unacceptable level, with more and more offenders using violence and abuse against shopworkers to do this. We will not stand for this. Everybody has a right to feel safe on the job.

This Government will end the effective immunity, introduced by the previous Government, granted to low level shoplifting of goods under £200 and introduce a new offence of assaulting a retail worker to protect the hardworking and dedicated staff that work in stores.