„Hier geht es um den Lebensunterhalt der Menschen“: Wie die zunehmenden Werkzeugdiebstähle Handwerker mittellos und verängstigt zurücklassen
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/apr/08/surging-tool-thefts-leaving-tradespeople-penniless-afraid
Von Bounty_drillah
8 Kommentare
I know people’s vans who have been done. It’s not just a few hundred quid. It’s thousands of pounds. Police come. Take statement. But realistically fuck all they can do.
Thankfully all my tools are company bought, I’d never leave personal tools in a van.
You’ll have the usual replies here „just empty your van each night“ yeah that’s not possible it’s basically a garage on wheels also some people won’t have space for that.
„Get them marked“ why? No one is going to try and track them
This is just one more step in the broken window.
We have so many petty crimes that either do get police investigation and then the courts don’t correctly punish, or just get crime numbered so insurance can pay back (but can you even insure tools left in vans overnight??)
We need a massive police hiring spree and just have loads working the beat. A visual copper stops more crimes than many would believe
My dad got done in the early 90s. Had his car broken into and most of his sparkie’s tools taken. It took him about a year to replace everything as he was only doing electrical work on the side, two or three small jobs a month.
He used a soldering iron to burn/carve ‚Stolen from <dad’s name>‘ into all his power tools, cases, and screwdriver handles afterwards. His thinking was that it *probably* wouldn’t stop them being stolen, but would make them harder to sell on.
No bigger lie than “non violent crime” getting shoved in the less serious category, ask any tradesman if they would rather be slapped or have all their tools stolen and I can guarantee which option 90% will chose.
Nicking stuff is scummy behaviour: Nicking someone’s tools is arguably worse because you’re not „just nicking stuff“ you’re directly affecting someone’s livelihood.
Can we go back to thieves being aggressively prosecuted again please?
I think one way of reducing this is making the obvious resale of stolen tools a little bit more difficult. Go to any car boot in the country and you’ll see tons and tons of stolen tools out in plain sight.
I’ve had my van done twice, the last time it was in the middle of the day whilst working in London last year, my van door was so badly fucked I had to ratchet strap it shut just to get home and then it took weeks to get a replacement because there were so many transits getting done there was a shortage of doors!!
Simple solution, if your caught stealing tools, minimum 5 years, and the fine is x2 of the value stolen and damage caused and your not released till it’s paid.
What people don’t realise this is hundreds of millions of pounds of theft and tradies have killed themselves over this
Robbing the tools that pay tax this is an everyone problem