Following the investigation’s publication, Sir Keir said it had revealed a “really important issue”.
He pledged more neighbourhood police officers “actually on the high street, in your patch and identifiable”, and increased powers for them to tackle anti-social behaviour and crime.
“We’ve already changed some of the rules in relation to how we deal with incidents in shops, but we must do this, we’re absolutely focused on it and I understand why people are concerned about it,” he told reporters.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch called the revelations “another example of the increasing lawlessness that is sadly such a feature of our towns and cities”.
“That is why the Conservatives have a plan to take back our streets,” she said, pledging swift and proper punishment for those who sell drugs, funding for 10,000 extra police officers and “live facial recognition to crime hotspots”.
The Liberal Democrats called the findings “shocking”, accusing the Conservatives of having “hollowed out our police forces and now Labour is failing to restore them fast enough”.
The party’s home affairs spokesperson Max Wilkinson said: “Organised gangs are exploiting this and communities are paying the price. We urgently need more police on our streets so that criminals know there are consequences for their actions.”
Reform UK’s home affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf said the investigation had exposed “the reality of a soft-touch Britain that has allowed organised crime to take over our high streets”.
“Years of Tory and Labour failure have hollowed out town centres and let criminal gangs flourish,” he said, adding that Reform UK would deliver a “zero-tolerance crackdown on crime, restore visible policing, and ensure those who break the law are properly punished”.
Green Party leader Zack Polanksi said councils were so “cash strapped” they weren’t able to investigate such activity on High Streets.
“The government needs to make sure they’re funding councils properly,” he said.