Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) reports of, (b) charges for and (c) convictions for shoplifting in (i) Preston and (ii) England there were in each of the last three years for which figures are available.

The Home Office collects information on the number of recorded offences for shoplifting and their investigative outcomes from police forces in England and Wales. These can be accessed here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/police-recorded-crime-open-data-tables

Data for the Preston Community Safety Partnership Area and England can be found in the table below:

Number of recorded offences of shoplifting and charges, by calendar year:

* - Figures for England exclude Devon & Cornwall and British Transport Police

The Ministry of Justice publishes data on the number of convictions for the offence ’46 Theft from shops’ in the Outcomes by Offence data tool: December 2022, which can be accessed here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/criminal-justice-system-statistics-quarterly-december-2022

Information about the number of convictions by Community Safety Partnership (CSP) is not available. Police Force Area-level breakdowns are available in this tool, though note this will relate to the location of the convicting court which differ from where the offence took place.

The Home Office collects and publishes data on arrests made by police forces in England and Wales, these are available here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/police-powers-and-procedures-stop-and-search-and-arrests-england-and-wales-year-ending-31-march-2022

However, these data are only collected and published at the broader offence level, for example 'theft offences', therefore more detailed breakdowns such as 'shoplifting' are not available.