Robert Jenrick tells shoplifter 'people like you should be in jail' in Brixton confrontation videos that sparked backlash

From the Newshound archive · first published 3 October 2026.

Reform UK treasury spokesman Robert Jenrick has sparked a fierce backlash after posting a series of videos showing him confronting suspected shoplifters outside a Greggs in Brixton, south London. In one clip, he pursues a woman he accuses of taking around ten bottles, telling her "people like you should be in jail and you would be under a Reform government." A second confrontation sees him retrieve a bottle of Coca-Cola from a man who eventually agrees to return it.

Jenrick said he was "sick of seeing brazen shoplifting and nothing ever happening," blaming Labour's early prisoner release for making the problem worse.

Critics branded the videos "hypocritical" and described them as "vigilante-style" stunts, with the confrontations drawing comparisons to citizen's arrest overreach.

Jenrick argued shoplifting is adding £50 to British families' weekly food bills, vowing Reform would "come down on shoplifters like a tonne of bricks."