Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment she has made of trends in the number of catalytic converter thefts in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England; and what steps her Department is taking with the (i) motor industry and (ii) police to reduce the number of those thefts in those areas.

Figures are not held on the number of catalytic converter thefts in England or by local area. The Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) collects data on incidents regarding theft from a vehicle, including details of the items stolen, such as car parts. From April 2019 to March 2020, an estimate of recorded household incidents from the CSEW shows that in 1.6% of incidents of theft from vehicles, a catalytic converter was stolen. The figures are published here: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/adhocs/12496catalyticconvertersstoleninincidentsoftheftfromvehiclesyearendingmarch2015toyearendingmarch2020crimesurveyforenglandandwales

We continue to work closely with police and motor manufacturers through the National Vehicle Crime Working Group, established by the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for vehicle crime and overseen by the Government’s Crime and Justice Taskforce, to understand what more can be done to tackle the theft of catalytic converters. The National Police Chiefs’ Council hosted a problem-solving workshop in November to bring together representatives from the motor industry, policing and Government to discuss the theft of catalytic converters.

The Government has provided funding to set up the National Infrastructure Crime Reduction Partnership, ensuring national co-ordination of policing and law enforcement partners to tackle metal theft, including the theft of catalytic converters. Through this, the partnership has already provided training to police forces and started sharing intelligence to target offenders and implement crime prevention measures.