t costs of increasing security measures, higher and sometimes prohibitive insurance premiums, and staff support initiatives. Auror, a technology platform that tracks crime and threats in some of the country’s major retailers, including Woolworths, Bunnings and Myer, recorded 800,000 incidents in stores nationwide in 2024. The incidents tracked by Auror include threatening behaviour, assaults, thefts and damage. The actual figure would, in all likelihood, exceed 1 million, allowing for retail businesses that don’t use Auror, and crime is continuing to escalate in the number of incidents and, critically, the more brazen and dangerous attacks on people and property. The escalating cost of retail crime Of course, theft is just one aspect of the current crime wave in Australia, with other offences including arson, ramraids through store windows, vandalism and extortion. Major retailers are demanding action from governments in tougher legislative measures, the deployment of more resources to apprehend and punish habitual criminals, and a national framework to tackle organised crime gangs. There is also increasing demand to tackle compounding issues such as addiction to drugs, gambling and alcohol, mental illness, social-media posts boasting of criminal exploits and, critically, the alarming increase in the use of weapons in crimes. Retail associations and retailers nationwide are calling for online reporting of crimes, for other states to adopt South Australia’s dedicated police retail crime taskforces, and broader use of the workplace protection orders that are in place in the Australian Capital Territory. Queensland’s “adult crime, adult time” election policy has prompted the Victorian State Opposition to run with a “break bail, face jail” policy. Victoria has the dubious honour of being the nation’s retail crime capital, accounting for around 30 per cent of the 800,000 reported incidents in 2024. It is not hyperbole to claim that the brazen and frequently violent offending is increasing the cost of living, damaging productivity, raising business costs and legal liability, actually closing businesses, and affecting staff recruitment and employee safety, as well as damaging and irrevocably changing lives. Yet there is apparently more concern from governments about the offenders and their legal rights and excuses than about the victims. Somewhat perplexing is the feeble response of the union movement to the danger to their members and the public from the escalating crime crisis. Retailers and their industry bodies are obviously lobbying premiers, attorneys-general and police ministers around Australia, but they need to expand their efforts to provide comprehensive data on the impacts and financial costs of this crime wave on constituents, retail employees and businesses to every member of Parliament around the country. Then it is time to double down, with direct approaches to government ministers responsible for mental health, hospitals and health services, small business, workers’ compensation, treasury, social services, and business development, to impress upon them that crime is directly affecting their portfolios. Leaders of parties not represented in governments and local government agencies also should be provided with more information, as their constituents are increasingly anxious about their safety in shopping centres and other public places, let alone in their homes and cars. Chris Rodwell, CEO of the Australian Retailers Association, has gone as far as saying retail centres could become ghost towns if retailers and their customers feel unsafe. Retailers are being forced to beef up their defences with body cams for staff, upgrades to video surveillance systems, lockout buttons and gates, reinforced storefronts and even reconfigured internal store fixtures allowing frequently targeted stock to be locked behind screens.  A weak government response to a growing crisis These initiatives require substantial cost outlays and are easier for major retailers than smaller, independent store owners to implement. Some of the measures larger stores are implementing are already making small businesses and independent chains with lower staff rosters more vulnerable, as evidenced by attacks from armed criminals on IGA supermarkets. Shopping centres are also having to implement new security measures after six shoppers were killed in a stabbing rampage in Sydney’s Westfield Bondi Junction last year, and a car rammed an entrance and drove at speed through a mall in Melbourne’s Northland shopping centre in recent months. Gang fights with weapons have become frequent in shopping complexes and strip centres, while ram raids on stores, including luxury retail outlets in Melbourne’s central business district are forcing local governments to expand bollards and other protective barriers. The retail industry has invested heavily to protect its customers, employees, stores and other assets and to deter criminals, an effective response to the escalating crime wave by governments has been lacking. All too often, police apprehend offenders only to have them freed on bail by courts with seemingly little regard to the danger they pose to the community or their arrest records and number of previous releases for offences while already out on bail. Whether it is an ideological view of justice, particularly for young offenders, the inadequacy of sentences or the fact that debt-laden governments don’t want to incur the costs of incarceration or difficulty in recruiting prison staff is debatable. However, it certainly does no favours for young offenders, or the organised crime gangs that have already recruited them, unless governments break the cycle. The idea that jail time will make offenders worse hardly stacks up when there are already so many violent crimes and the perception that the consequences of the offending is not that serious and can potentially even be avoided altogether. The failure of governments to stop the most dangerous and widespread crime wave ever seen in Australia makes government commitments to safe workplaces a joke, let alone their fundamental responsibility to protect citizens and property owners. It is time for governments now to stop the hollow sympathy for victims at ministerial media conferences and to respond to the sensible and urgent demands of the retail industry and the community to tackle the current crime wave.