§ Mr. OatenTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment he has made of the role of(a) pawnbrokers and (b) shops dealing in second hand goods in providing a market for stolen goods; and if he will make a statement. [172400]
§ Ms BlearsIn 1998, Dr. Mike Sutton produced, on behalf of the Home Office, a report entitled 'Handling stolen goods and theft a market reduction approach'. This identified five distinct markets for stolen goods, one of which was commercial outlets such as pawn brokers and second hand goods shops.
Under the Targeted Policing Initiative (part of the Crime Reduction Programme, which ran from 1999 to 2003), we provided funding totalling around £1.4 million to projects in Stockport, Kent and West Mercia aimed at reducing the market in stolen goods. The second hand goods trade was just one of several distribution channels for stolen goods that these projects targeted. In particular, the Stockport and Kent projects used local legislation, which regulates second hand goods outlets Under the terms of the Kent and Medway Acts 2001, Kent and Medway Councils must also present the Home Office with a report on the working provisions of the Acts by 1 December, which will subsequently be laid before Parliament.
The Home Office has also commissioned the University of Kent to evaluate the effectiveness of these and similar pieces of legislation and we are planning to lay a summary of the results of this research before Parliament at the same time.
We are also aware of further research that is being undertaken into thieves' preferred method of disposing of stolen property and we will be looking to see what this adds to our existing knowledge.
Our programme of work to drive down the market for stolen goods includes, amongst other things, activities aimed at those pawn brokers and other second hand goods outlets that deal in stolen property.