City centre employees have shared their stories of violence and abuse on the shop floor with their MP. Jayne Kirkham met Tesco, Primark, Poundland and Co-op employees on Friday morning.

A recent survey from retail trade union USDAW showed nearly a fifth of shop workers suffered a violent attack last year, almost half reported being threatened, and 70 per cent were verbally abused by customers.

“The experiences I've heard about are scary and not something anyone should have to deal with in their place of work,” said Ms Kirkham.

“The repercussions of being persistently treated this way are incredibly worrying. Retail workers often feel threatened, even fearful, about coming into work.

“Retail staff and shop managers feel powerless. They are going about their jobs in the very public workspace of the shop floor, and they absolutely should feel secure and safe in that environment.”

Despite the presence of Street Rangers, Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) officers and volunteer Special Constables who carry out foot patrols in targeted areas, and ShopWatch/DISC radio schemes to track professional thieves working in coordinated teams, shop managers in the city still struggle with shoplifting and anti-social culture.

Ms Kirkham promised new measures including additional neighbourhood police and PCSOs back on the street, with guaranteed patrols in retail crime hotspots and a named officer for shopkeepers and retail staff to contact directly.

New money is to be invested in prevention and training, including an extra £5 million over three years to crack down on organised shop theft gangs; there is also a new stand-alone offence for criminals that assault retail workers, and the reversal of a charter defining shoplifting as a 'low-value' crime.

Interim results from a survey of over 4,000 retail staff by trade union USDAW shows that in the last 12 months, 69 per cent have experienced verbal abuse, 45 per cent were threatened by a customer and 17 per cent were assaulted. Around 70 per cent of these incidents were triggered by shoplifting, and two-thirds of those were linked to addiction. 

The British Retail Consortium reports that shoplifting costs the retail industry over £1.8 billion a year.Co-op stores saw a 44 per cent rise in shoplifting incidents in 2023 with over 1,000 incidents every day across its 2,500 stores, and a 34 per cent rise in physical attacks on staff.

However, Devon & Cornwall Police did not attend in 93 per cent of cases where an shoplifting offender was detained in Co-op stores. In the last five years, the company has spent £240m on store security including body-worn cameras, CCTV and product protection.

"I able to assure many people that robust responses to these crimes that devastate lives and corrode our communities are forthcoming from this new government,” said Ms Kirkham.  

"Our plans will put a police presence back into our town centres, something that should be a given for any civilised society. It will take time, but we are dedicated to rebuilding the trust between the retail community, shoppers, and the police service."

Truro Business Improvement District (BID) funds the Truro Rangers and co-funds an ASB officer position with Truro City Council and Cornwall Council.

BID manager Alun Jones said: “We are very grateful that Jayne made time to visit businesses and to highlight the concerns surrounding shoplifting and anti-social behaviour.

“Figures show an 18 per cent uplift in shoplifting figures in the city last year, and every week, we hear of an incident among our members. As a BIDF, we encourage them to report any incident, as it really does make a difference – a police investigation is unlikely to take place without a report.”

Truro is also one of the areas benefiting from Devon and Cornwall Police’s hotspot policing with visible community engagement in areas where ASB and serious violence are prevalent.