Safer Shops is an alliance between The Motor Trade Association and the Dairy and Business Owners Group. Photo: RNZ/ Tom Taylor
A recently founded retail advocacy group has called for welfare checks by police.
Safer Shops was formed as an alliance between The Motor Trade Association and the Dairy and Business Owners Group, and is pushing for greater protection for service stations, dairies and liquor stores.
Dairy and Business Owners Group Vice Chair Ash Parmar told Checkpoint assaults and shoplifting were big issues for many within the industry.
Too much was being put on the small business owners to protect themselves from things like ram-raids he said.
"I don't really think it was police or government response that brought them down. Business owners just got smarter and installed their own bollards and made changes to their businesses," Parmar said.
Although ram-raids were less common than they had been previously, that did not necessarily mean retail crime had decreased, he said.
Many dairies in Hamilton were being driven to screening their customers before granting them entry, he said. "Which is really sad, because normal customers are getting profiled as well."
Increased police presence in stores by way of welfare checks would make dairy, service station and liquor store employees feel safer, he said.
"If they can make resources available for the gang patch ban I'm sure they can do it in this space as well.
"I can remember a time when uniformed officers used to come into the shop and just have a bit of a chat... but that hasn't been happening for some time," he said.
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