Food retailers have seen a “massive” increase in pensioner shoplifters over the last year, a security firm has said

While I am sympathetic to anyone who has to shoplift to eat, I'd suggest a little skepticism after noting two things:

One the time period (almost exactly lines up with the period that Labour has been in power) and,

Two the source - the Telegraph is nicknamed the Torygraph for a reason...they are the mouth piece for the conservative party and make no bones about it.

I'm no fan of the Blue Tories - Sir Keir would comfortably fit into the Conservative party of a decade ago (before their heads exploded) - I'm quite disappointed in their performance. But I'd counsel a little caution on taking what smells strongly of a propaganda piece at face value

Edit Red Tories doh. The American reversed colours has seeped into my psyche lol

He added: “Retailers don’t tend to involve the police when they’re dealing with pensioners. Stores tend to want to handle it on their own.

“It’s not good publicity for a supermarket if it got out that a pensioner had been handed over to the police for shoplifting.”

Sounds like the numbers could be higher then, if it's not getting reported.

I think anyone who's worked in retail knows they've always been a high demographic with shoplifting. No one reports it because it's just an old lady/gent and mental health comes in as a blanket enablement. Now we have people unable to meet their own basic living standards and having their support taken away in benefit of the rich, you'll obviously see a lot more of it.

If you see someone stealing food, no, you didn't.

Jesus, how fucking depressing is that

And yet they're the only demographic who gets a pay that always matches or exceeds inflation. Seems weird that they'd see a disproportionate increase in shoplifting.

I'm sure glad they have their pension triple locked so it always goes up with inflation at the least....

Good for them. If the most vulnerable can't afford to live, fuck the corps and government.