Flagship high streets are at “serious risk” without urgent national action on retail crime, according to representatives from High Streets UK.
The national initiative, which unites Business Improvement Districts from flagship cities, is calling on the government to reform current systems, which it has claimed “cannot deliver” on ambitions to tackle high street crime.
In February, the British Retail Consortium’s annual crime survey found that incidents of violence and abuse climbed 53% to over 2,000 per day in 2024, spanning racial abuse, sexual harassment and physical assault.
High Streets UK has set out a four-point policy proposal to tackle prolific offending, business crime, anti-social behaviour and organised criminal activity taking place on the UK’s flagship high streets.
While the group has welcomed recent government commitments on retail crime – including reprioritising shoplifting and making assaulting a retail worker a standalone offence – it warns that criminal justice infrastructure, police funding and strategic prioritisation of other crime categories must also be urgently reviewed.
Its key recommendations include a ringfenced policing uplift in and around flagship high streets, developing a clear plan for criminal justice system reform, including strengthened provisions around Criminal Behaviour Orders, and a co-ordinated nationwide multi-agency approach to tackling organised crime.
High Streets UK is also recommending that the government pilots a standardised nationwide framework for businesses to report crime.
“Flagship high streets are engines of the local and national economy, drivers of tourism, and anchors for communities. But without urgent national action on crime, they are at serious risk,” said High Streets UK chair Dee Corsi.
“We have welcomed the government’s renewed focus on retail crime in particular. But we must go further and faster to tackle all types of crime affecting high streets, having a devastating effect on businesses and communities, tarnishing the UK’s global reputation, and jeopardising tourism and investment.”
Flagship high streets are engines of the local and national economy, drivers of tourism, and anchors for communities. But without urgent national action on crime, they are at serious risk.
“We have welcomed the government’s renewed focus on retail crime in particular. But we must go further and faster to tackle all types of crime affecting high streets, having a devastating effect on businesses and communities, tarnishing the UK’s global reputation, and jeopardising tourism and investment.
“At our Safer High Streets Forum, we shared our frontline experience of the international criminal gangs, business crime, prolific offenders and anti-social behaviour affecting our high streets – none of which can be meaningfully tackled with the current systems and resources in place.
“Together, we have set out a clear, practical blueprint for change. It’s now time to focus on delivery.”
No comments yet