The Countryside Alliance fully supports the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Bill and has assisted in developing it alongside other stakeholders in farming, insurance, equipment manufacturing and the police. The Home Office has also been involved and we are hopeful that it will secure Government support.
As long-term campaigners on the issue of combatting rural crime and a founding member of the National Rural Crime Network, the Countryside Alliance conducts an annual survey of rural communities’ experiences and perceptions over the past calendar year. Since the Bill was first introduced in the House of Commons, we concluded our 2022 survey and published the results. The 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.
Whilst the Bill was not amended during its House of Commons stages, 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.
We're calling 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.