Retail Crime Spree in Tipperary

Thefts from shops in towns and villages across County Tipperary have spiralled, leaving already pressured traders in towns like Nenagh and Roscrea facing considerable financial losses.

The huge jump in shoplifting in the county has been revealed in CSO statistics highlighted by Ireland South Fianna Fáil MEP, Cynthia Ní Mhurchú who said the offenders are “giving the two fingers to the State”.

And while shoplifting has increased in most counties since 2003, Tipperary recorded the second highest hike in the entire country in that period. Ms Ní Mhurchú says she is now calling for tough action against “the minority of people who feel it is acceptable to steal from hard-working small family retail businesses.”

Whilst there has only been a 2.4% increase in shoplifting in Tipperary between 2023 and 2024, the longterm trend in the county has seen shoplifting dramatically increase since 2003.

Back then there were only 220 recorded incidents of shoplifting in the county of Tipperary. However, since then the number of thefts from shops in the county has more than trebled.

Last year the number of shoplifting incidents in Tipperary was 719 – way above the rate of increase in most other counties.

Ms Ní Mhurchú said thefts from shops in neighbouring County Clare in 2024 were substantially lower than in Tipperary – 480 cases.

Cases taken by the gardaí against shoplifting are now almost a weekly feature in the Nenagh District Court where the sitting judge Marie Keane warned last month that such crimes would not be tolerated after a young woman appeared before her for theft offences in two stores in the town.

Amongst the measures Ms Ní Mhurchú is calling for to immediately address shoplifting is for the Government to introduce the Retail Crime Strategy promised in its Programme for Government.

The Ireland South MEP has also called for other measures included in the programme to be introduced immediately to tackle the problems being experienced by traders in towns like Nenagh.

She has urged the Government to introduce mandatory prison sentences for anyone caught shoplifting on more than one occasion.

Ms Ní Mhurchú said the Public Order Acts should be updated to allow a prolific offender of retail crime to be excluded from a premises for a certain period of time.

She wants to see support for targeted garda operations to tackle retail crime and remove assets from those suspected of organised retail theft.

Another measure she wants to see introduced is a new law making it a specific offence for assaulting a retail worker, and an end to the practice of ‘retail defamation’, where someone can sue a retailer for defamation if they are stopped with the bona fide belief that they have stolen something from the shop.

Ms Ní Mhurchú said small retailers are fed up with what they see as a revolving door justice system for shoplifters.

Ms Ní Mhurchú noted that some of the biggest jumps in shoplifting between the year 2003 and 2024 occurred in countries like Tipperary, Wexford, Wicklow, Kildare and Limerick.

She also noted that the rate in many other counties had actually decreased in recent years. Counties like Mayo, Donegal, Waterford, Kerry, Clare, and Galway all recorded percentage decreases for the number of recorded shoplifting offences between 2023 and 2024.

Ms Ní Mhurchú attributed this to more focused Garda actions of late and she praised gardaí for trends indicating that they were now making progress against shoplifters.