Keir Starmer puts shoplifters ‘on notice’ in crackdown on epidemic of thefts and assaults on retail workers

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Get our free View from Westminster email SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. At a speech today at the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers’s annual conference, Sir Keir said he’s putting shoplifters “on notice”. But if Labour takes power, we won’t stand by while crime takes over our streets.” The Labour leader has made tackling crime one of his five missions, including introducing a new Community Policing Guarantee to crack down on shoplifting and antisocial behaviour in Britain’s town centres, with a surge in neighbourhood policing. Sir Keir says the mission is driven by his own values and has been informed by his experience as director for public prosecutions between 2008-13. open image in gallery Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer is visiting the USDAW conference today Labour say this ‘Shoplifter’s Charter’, coupled with hollowed-out neighbourhood policing, has left local businesses and retail workers at the “mercy of criminals”. This is also an economic argument.” open image in gallery Over 248,000 shoplifting cases were closed without a suspect being found last year, according to Labour analysis “Only the other day, a survey by the Chartered Management Institute found that 80 per cent of managers believe that strengthening workers’ rights is beneficial for productivity.” The party’s new deal for workers will include strengthening the protections afforded to all workers by banning zero-hours contracts, ending fire and rehire and scrapping qualifying periods for basic rights, which leave working people waiting up to two years for basic protections.