Retailers warn of shopping ‘ghost towns’ without crackdown on crime

Australia’s peak retail body has warned shopping precincts could become “ghost towns” without a national response to retail theft as retailers lose billions of dollars and workers face increasing levels of threat to their safety.

Australian Retail Council chief executive Chris Rodwell said the federal government needed to step in and replace the patchwork measures in use across various jurisdictions, adding that the problem was particularly acute in Victoria.

“I think as an Australian community, we need to say enough is enough,” Rodwell said.

Victoria has emerged as the retail crime hotspot of the nation. Credit: Jason South

“We need leadership from the federal government in really combating retail crime. We should be looking for a reduction in retail crime, not simply trying to put a lid on the current levels of retail crime.”

More than 800,000 incidents of retail crime were lodged last year through the retail theft reporting platform Auror, which industry leaders believe has led to over $9 billion in annual losses.

About 30 per cent of those events were reported from Victoria. However, according to Victoria Police statistics, there were only 82,000 incidences of retail crime in the last year, a discrepancy Rodwell said was proof that the extent of the issue was “under-reported” by authorities.

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The loss figures also don’t take into account the huge outlays large retailers, especially supermarkets, have spent on security measures in recent years.

Though the problem is nationwide, Victoria has emerged as a clear hotspot, where crime has reached its highest level on record, including among youth. Rodwell noted a near-30 per cent increase in incidents over the past year. Threatening incidents in the state were up 52 per cent over the same period.

‘In NSW police seem to be much more proactive on retail crime, they have an intelligence team, whereas in Victoria, it’s not clear that there’s been much ownership of organised retail crime as a problem.’

Not only is the rise in Victoria higher than other states, Rodwell said the figures were almost certainly under-reported, and that there was industry-wide grievance at the lack of ability to report theft instances online in Victoria.

The number of “threatening events” in Victoria has surged 52 per cent compared with the previous year, and national incidents involving weapons have increased by 66 per cent, Auror statistics show.

Michael Townsley, a professor at Griffith University’s school of criminology and criminal justice, who researches retail theft, said that while organised crime syndicates exist in NSW and Victoria, the latter had emerged as a larger target for a range of reasons.

“Loss prevention managers at national retailers say it’s been a standing frustration that police in Victoria are a difficult service to engage with,” Townsley said.

“In NSW police seem to be much more proactive on retail crime, they have an intelligence team, whereas in Victoria, it’s not clear that there’s been much ownership of organised retail crime as a problem.”

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The surge in thefts across Victoria is a sign that syndicates don’t feel deterred, Townsley said, which leads to stores in the state being seen as an easier target. He noted that his research had indicated that even crime groups from NSW travel temporarily into Victoria to steal from businesses.

In response to questions from this masthead, Victoria Police denied the suggestion it was weak on retail theft or wasn’t proactive in addressing the problem.

A spokesman referenced a major investigation which busted two syndicates that had stolen $10 million and $700,000 each. They also pointed to 130 arrests and 1150 charges in the Melbourne CBD over the past year for retail theft, and operations in regional towns too, such as 135 arrests of shoplifters in a year.

“Victoria Police has no intelligence that offenders are travelling from interstate to steal from retail stores,” it said in a statement. “In fact, our intelligence suggests as many as half of all offenders are first-time shoplifters.”

However, Victoria Police’s suggestion that the problem is driven by opportunistic individuals offending for the first time appears to conflict with statistics from the industry, as well as Crime Stoppers Victoria. The independent organisation cites a figure on its retail theft website that repeat offenders account for nearly 70 per cent of all incidents. A Victoria Police spokesman said it backed its own figure over Crime Stoppers’, which is an independent not-for-profit organisation.

Rodwell pointed to San Francisco, where brazen organised retail crime reached a peak in 2022 and contributed to the city’s economic “doom loop” that led residents to flee the city, as an example of what can happen if the problem is left unchecked.

“We can see from international experience that if we don’t bring the levels of retail crime down, they will continue to escalate on a trend line that is frankly out of control.

“You’ve seen entire retail precincts effectively turn into ghost towns, and where communities have been fundamentally altered as a result. We want to avoid that situation,” Rodwell said.

Several of Australia’s biggest retailers have invested millions in anti-theft technology and also pinpointed suburban Victoria as where organised crime is most rife. Coles has begun reversing long-running theft issues by rolling out security gates, camera scanning technology and “bottom of trolley” technology across hundreds of stores, where health and beauty items and premium cuts of red meat are being systematically stolen.

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When asked whether Victoria was a theft hotspot for the supermarket chain, chief executive Leah Weckert said there was “great intent” across police forces around the country to stem the problem but noted varying approaches across different jurisdictions and said South Australia was the “gold standard”.

“In South Australia, we’re actually seeing some of these incidents starting to decline in numbers because of the framework that they use there,” she said. South Australia recorded consecutive monthly declines in shop theft after introducing new legislation to combat assault and establishing a dedicated retail crime police taskforce that has led to thousands of charges.

“I think that is of interest and worthy of note for other jurisdictions where, potentially we are seeing that same trajectory,” said Weckert.

The Australian Retail Council’s Rodwell added that a national conversation about facial recognition technology was needed to help communities understand its benefits in stemming crime.

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The technology is already in use at airports and sporting stadiums, and has led to fewer violent incidents in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Bunnings has fallen afoul of the Information Commissioner’s Office over its use of facial recognition technology, but is seeking a review of the finding.

“There’s no doubt facial recognition technology can be used responsibly in a way which continues to support the privacy of all Australians,” said Rodwell.

Queensland and NSW have adopted “Jack’s Law”, named after the death of teenager Jack Beasley who was stabbed to death in 2019, which allows police to use metal-detecting wands to uncover weapons in public places. More than a thousand weapons in Queensland have been removed as a result. In late 2023, NSW introduced tougher penalties for those assaulting or abusing retail workers.

In some Dan Murphy’s and BWS stores, augmented reality and lock-out buttons have been implemented to prevent threatening individuals from entering the store.

Rebel Sport operator Super Retail Group chief Anthony Heraghty said it was a “completely unacceptable situation” for organised thieves to target stores in urban Victoria “flashing a knife” and reselling thousands’ worth of high-value items online.

“There is an economic equation to this,” said Heraghty. “[These items] can be sold at a profit.”

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