Equipment Theft Bill set for final Commons stages

A Countryside Alliance briefing on the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Bill, scheduled for its Remaining Stages in the House of Commons on Friday 03 March.

• The Countryside Alliance fully supports this Bill and has assisted in developing it alongside other stakeholders in farming, insurance, equipment manufacturing and the police.
• The Bill was not amended in Committee but there was clarification that the Government intends to extend its provisions beyond agricultural equipment to other commercial tools. We welcome this, with the assurance that any extra time required to develop this extension will not affect the plan to implement regulations for ATVs by Christmas.
• At Second Reading our briefing focused on the findings from what was at the time our most recent Rural Crime Survey, published in December 2021. Since then, our latest survey has concluded and the results of published at the end of February.
• The new 2022 survey revealed that 43% of respondents reported having had a crime committed against them in the past year and of those, 35% reported having experienced agricultural machinery theft. This was the second most reported crime, just 3% behind fly-tipping.
• In the 2020 Rural Crime Survey, agricultural machinery theft was reported as respondents' top priority for police to tackle. In the 2021 survey it had fallen to the third position but has now returned to the second.
• We call on parliamentarians and the Government to maintain their overwhelming support for this Bill, secure its passage, commence its provisions in good time and monitor its effectiveness closely.

To read the briefing in full, please click here.

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