Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the effect of the use of drone devices on the rate of home burglaries in England; and how many crimes were recorded involving drones in (a) 2017, (b) 2018 and (c) 2019.

The long-term trend in burglaries recorded by the police in England has been downward and the number recorded in 2019 was 7% lower than in 2018.

The Home Office does not hold information on the number of recorded crimes, including burglaries, which involved drones.

The Government recognises the particularly invasive nature of burglary and the impact it can have on victims. Whilst police recorded crime statistics for England and Wales showed that burglary had fallen, too many people experience this traumatic crime each year. We are taking a proactive approach to driving down these crimes and have announced a £25m Safer Streets Fund to help prevent these crimes as well as supporting the recruitment of 20,000 new police officers to ensure they have the resources to deal with these crimes when they do occur. We are working to combat burglary in a number of areas, including: making homes more secure, working with the police to examine what more can be done to prevent offenders disposing of stolen goods, and improving the police and wider criminal justice system response.