A retail boss has said he \u201ccould not believe\u201d comments made by the head of the Metropolitan Police, calling on the industry to \u201cstep up and do better\u201d to help stop shoplifting.<\/p>\n
In an interview with The Telegraph, Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said some stores needed to do more to help police tackle the issue.<\/p>\n
Andrew Goodacre, CEO of the British Independent Retailers Association, acknowledged the recent police effort to crack down on such crimes, but said he was \u201cflabbergasted\u201d by the comments.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is slightly off field for him to come out and say \u2018we have done our bit now come out and do yours\u2019,\u2019 he told the Mail Online.<\/p>\n
In an interview with The Telegraph, Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said some stores needed to do more to help police tackle the issue (PA Archive)\u201cI am really surprised he has come out with this. In fact, we have all been working hard together \u2013 retailers, police and PCCs – as part of the Police and Retail Crime Action Group which was set up two years ago by the last government to tackle shoplifting and it has been a collaborative effort to get to that point.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are grateful that police forces around the country have \u2018stepped up\u2019 to use his words. Response times have improved for example and more recently there have been high profile raids on illicit shops.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat disappoints me is that it has been collaboration that has got us to this point, not just him and police forces.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said the sector was still losing \u00a32 billion in stock a year, despite having spent \u00a31.2 billion on high tech extra security measures in the last two years.<\/p>\n
Speaking to The Telegraph, Sir Mark said the retail industry was \u201cright to say to us, \u2018please step up more\u2019\u201d. (PA Wire)Speaking to The Telegraph, Sir Mark said the retail industry was \u201cright to say to us, \u2018please step up more\u2019\u201d.<\/p>\n
He said: \u201cAnd we have done. They need to step up more. There are some of them who are fantastic and I\u2019m not going to name a good and bad list, that would be invidious. But I\u2019m just putting a marker down.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cThe retail sector, a couple of years ago, was right to be cross with policing across the country. But in London, over the last year or so, we\u2019ve really doubled down on it. We\u2019re making a lot of progress, but I need to challenge back now to the retail sector. They now need to do better.\u201d<\/p>\n
He claimed that while some stores worked with the police to help solve crimes, others failed to provide images or statements blamed the cost.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey can give them time to give a statement and they will pay them work time to go to court. Others won\u2019t do any of that,\u201d he told The Telegraph. <\/p>\n
\u201cSo if they\u2019re not prepared to roll up their sleeves as corporate victims, it\u2019s going to be tough for us to make progress.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A retail boss has said he \u201ccould not believe\u201d comments made by the head of the Metropolitan Police, calling on the industry to \u201cstep up and do better\u201d to help stop shoplifting. In an interview with The Telegraph, Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said some stores needed to do more to help police tackle the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5174,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[173],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n