Arrest a shoplifter says Tory MP. Would you? I wouldn't.

[newnamethanks]

This is the latest economy they wish to foist upon us. Please detain anyone you spot helping themselves to goods which belong to a shop. Don't think about your own personal safety, just be public spirited enough to interrupt that junkie over there helping himself. As if.

No I would never intervene. My ex did once quite spectacularly trip up a shoplifter who was running from police, he went absolutely flying.

theres no police presence, but when there’s a royal event you see thousands and thousands lining the route. Where do they all hide ?

Absolutely not.

I’m obviously not going to risk my own safety to protect the commercial interests of Tesco and its shareholders. If they have an issue with shoplifting, that is for their management to resolve. Given that they have just announced a profit of £1.4bn for the first half of the year, they can afford it.

With all the knives and guns they’re carrying these days? No ta

Meanwhile nutjob Penny Mordaunt, earlier today at the Tory conference, continued the rhetoric and urged everyone to 'stand up and fight!' maybe a dozen times in her vacuous, populist speech. Fight! Fight!

Ridiculous idea. For a start, you'll probably end up punched or even stabbed. And what if they've got friends lurking nearby? On top of all that, you'd probably be arrested for assault.

AutumnCrow · Today 13:13
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Meanwhile nutjob Penny Mordaunt, earlier today at the Tory conference, continued the rhetoric and urged everyone to 'stand up and fight!' maybe a dozen times in her vacuous, populist speech. Fight! Fight!

With a great, big sword, presumably.,

Ffs

I wouldn't personally arrest them but I would report to them to security.

I have no training, skills (or insurance) to personally get involved with arresting someone. But definitely report.

I work in retail and we are told not to touch shoplifters. The most we are allowed to do is tell them to put stuff back. It's dangerous to try and apprehend a desperate person.

I have zero motivation to do something that could easily backfire on account of me not being a trained security guard and not knowing 100% for certain that the person concerned was a shoplifter. It is very easy to misinterpret nowadays, with all these handheld devices, self-service etc. it really isnt in anyone's best interests to get embroiled in something that is none of the customer's business.

they have security cameras and paid security personnel for that. NMP. And probably for something that costs a couple of quid. No way.

Asian friend of mine became aware that she was being followed around the store by a not-very-subtle store detective. He was so busy concentrating on her that he missed someone blatantly filling a carrier bag before walking out. She thought about pointing the shoplifter out to him, but unsurprisingly in all the circumstances decided that if he was too bigoted and incompetent to do his job properly she wasn't going to help him out.

Thanks, but no thanks, don't fancy being stabbed by a dirty hypodermic needle just to protect the profit margin and CEO bonuses of Tesco.

@user1497207191 of course I'm going to compare against the peak rather than just pick a random year.

@EnterFunnyNameHere they still have separate budgets of course, it's more about ideology: small statism and an obsession with disposing of public assets and reducing public spending. The irony is of course that we are now paying higher taxes than at any time since WWII while having the most poorly run public services and infrastructure in my (admittedly only 50 year) memory.

Oh yes, great idea. I can't wait to get stabbed in defense of Tesco's profits, or arrested for assault.

Same when there's a murder etc - huge numbers of police just stood around "protecting" the scene, or officers sat in their cars blocking the roads, etc.

Even with that Sycamore Gap tree, there were pictures in the media of half a dozen officers just stood around "protecting" the blue tape cordon, hours (next day?) after it happened and after loads of public had traipsed all over the "crime" scene. Just why?

Then, of course, after some murder or shooting or assault, even when the prime suspect is arrested and police say they're not looking for anyone else, they manage to find officers for extra neighbourhood patrols to "re-assure" locals! Just why - the perpetrator is in custody and they're not looking for anyone else!

It's all smoke and mirrors.

Amazing they always manage to find officers for big events, football matches, crime scenes "protection" etc., but seldom for actual "minor" crimes!

Police your fellow citizen

Which is what we were encouraged to do during the lockdowns/restrictions. This is an extension of that and as so many were willing to tattle on their neighbours during the lockdowns its not really surprising its lead to them thinking they can test this and see how it goes down

Agree with this. I can't stand the Tories but I'm not convinced Starmer's lot would do any better.
As far as I'm concerned, Labour and Conservative are two cheeks of the same arse!

No way.

I worked for ASDA and got chatting to the Security staff.
At that time they were not employed directly by Asda somehow and didn't even get the discount card, they got minimum wage and that's it.
Whilst I was doing a shift, 3 big rugby playing looking blokes came in, grabbed a load of bottles of drink from the alcohol section and headed to the exit.

The security guard bless him, just a kid, 10 stone soaked through. The blokes gave him a choice, move or they'd kick the fucking shit out of him.
He moved, thankfully, £200 worth of booze ain't worth taking a kicking off 3 blokes for especially when you're paid less than £7 an hour.
Manager didn't see it that way though... he came rushing just after the blokes had left and started yelling at the guard for letting them leave...
Until me, being a twat, paused stacking Scones in the little shelf by the doors suggested manager go chase the blokes down and demand the goods back, they'd only just left..
he muttered something about once they'd left the property there was anything he could do..
"But they literally just walked out the door, they're probably still on the carpark, that's Asda property isn't it?"

Mutter mutter wander away... ah good times.

13 years of Tory rule. They'd privatise the Police if they could get away with it.

No way would I do that! Far too dangerous; as PPs have said, what if the shoplifter has a weapon? Completely batshit idea.

Not a chance. There was an incident in our town a few years ago where a shoplifter was grabbed (by a security guard!) and they fell, concealed bottles in their jacket smashed and they died.
I wouldn’t want anything like that on my conscience. Plus you never know who is armed.

They use baby milk to pad out their drugs to sell

The tories can do one and employ enough police to go around , I wouldn't even stop a bank robber .