Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to reduce shoplifting in (a) Fylde and (b) Lancashire.

Through our Safer Streets Mission, we are committed to ensuring that people feel safe on our streets and in their communities.

To help tackle retail crime, we will provide £5 million over the next three years to continue to fund Opal, the national policing intelligence unit for serious organised acquisitive crime.

We will also invest £2 million over the next three years in the National Business Crime Centre which provides a resource for both police and businesses to learn, share and support each other to prevent and combat crime.

Through our Crime and Policing Bill, this Government has introduced a standalone offence of assaulting a retail worker to protect the hardworking and dedicated staff that work in stores. We will also end the effective immunity for shop theft of and below £200 sending a clear message that any level of shop theft is illegal and will be taken seriously.