Keir Starmer is handing shoplifters a licence to steal in yet more lawless chaos

I’ll let you in on a secret. We radio phone-in hosts have a batch of tried and trusted subjects we know are guaranteed to set the phone lines buzzing. One, of course, is potholes. There isn’t a listener in the land without an impassioned view on the subject. Another is pie. Everyone remembers that Proustian moment when the taste of their grandmother’s apple and blackberry sauce encased in crisp shortcrust burst upon their infant tongue. Cyclists evoke love and loathing in equal measure. Yet, in 2026, one issue – and I know there’s a war on – eclipses all others. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you SHOPLIFTING.

Ask callers if they’ve seen it/done it/ been the victims of this nefarious epidemic of petty pilfering or organised crime, and you activate an avalanche. My own producer was locked into his local charity shop when a down-at-heel chap was caught stealing underwear. Shoppers were detained until police came to deal with the miscreant. Most felt sorry for the fellow reduced to nicking secondhand Y-fronts.

We’ve all seen a pale, shabby individual shoving bananas into their coat pockets and been flooded with compassion, not censure. We’ve witnessed obvious addicts frantically purloining items with shaking hands and wished they could be helped, not punished.

Increasingly, though, most of us have also seen the balaclava-wearing criminals, sweeping whole shelves of expensive goods into huge sacks, sometimes wielding baseball bats or even knives, defying security guards to try stopping them as they haul away their swag. They brazenly swoop repeatedly on the same chains, knowing that security staff are not allowed to lay a hand on them, and they will escape unscathed.

In the same week M&S beseeched London Mayor Sadiq Khan to deploy more resources to protect retail staff from assault and deter shoplifters, and Iceland boss Lord Walker argued passionately in favour of Spanish-style truncheons to aid in-store security, Keir Starmer’s Government quietly implemented new sentencing guidelines that could allow 12,000 shoplifters to avoid prison and a long-serving Waitrose employee was fired for trying to stop a man stealing Easter eggs.

Shoplifting is not a victimless crime. Thieves have been handed a licence to steal items worth up to £250 without penalty. Honest customers end up footing the bill.

Callers suggested guard dogs, admission by loyalty card and naming and shaming perpetrators before pelting them with rotten tomatoes. Retail workers are scared and frustrated. Police are thin on the ground. Repeat offenders roam free. Who will deliver us from this lawless chaos?

It's never 'just a kiss'

Trust plain-speaking Sharon Stone, 68, to spill the beans on Hollywood’s best kisser. She’s puckered up with heartthrobs Michael Douglas, Richard Gere and Sylvester Stallone, but her warmest words are for Robert De Niro, 82, who kissed her “right out of my shoes” when they were filming Casino in 1995.

So stratospheric was the snog that both enthusiastically agreed to director Martin Scorsese’s request for an entirely unnecessary retake. I remain astounded by the fact that a kiss is most definitely never “just a kiss”.

The meeting of lips is so devastatingly unpredictable. Kissing a chap you adore can be the dampest of squibs, while smooching a fellow you don’t like much or even fancy can spark comets. Till you try you can’t know tell prince from frog. The best part, of course, is that sampling is free, fun and doesn’t get you pregnant.

We deserve answers on this booking

Thankfully the concert has now been cancelled but whoever thought it was smart to book Kanye West, AKA Ye, to headline London’s Wireless Festival in the first place? This man has a history of antisemitic comments and as also praised Hitler?

The world’s riven with hatred. There were 3,700 racist attacks against Jewish people in the UK in 2025, including the first fatal antisemitic terrorist attack on British soil since records began, at Manchester’s Heaton Park Synagogue. Four ambulances funded by a Jewish charity offering non-denominational help to the sick and injured were set on fire last month.

Britain’s Jews are living with fear and bewilderment. Wireless is supposed to be life-affirming. Crowds gather to celebrate music, sunshine and freedom. West disseminates division and bigotry. The sponsors were right to withdraw support but the question remains who thought West was a good fit for Wireless?

You haven't lived until you've given this a go...

If you are watching the pennies and need furniture, head straight to your nearest auction house. Mark Ellin, partner at Burstow and Hewett in East Sussex, has just sold an exquisite George III mahogany bookcase for £400.

He has the owner’s original receipt from 1989. He shelled out £29,000. Homes are shrinking, tastes are changing and beautifully made furniture is now cheaper than gimcrack rubbish cobbled together out of MDF.

Dining rooms have disappeared, so gloriously elegant tables and chairs go for a song. Mid-century furniture – think Ercol or G-plan – is all the rage. Everything else goes for peanuts. Buying at auction is not merely a fertile source of bargains; it’s also eco-friendly and tremendous fun.

I defy you not to get carried away, waggle your paddle and end up with a box of ‘paintings’ you haven’t had the common sense to check in advance. Put that down to experience. You haven’t lived until you’ve bid £67 for an intricately inlaid sewing table and found it stuffed with needles and thread.

Keep it merry and fluffy... for now!

Online daters are pursuing “whimsy”. They long for light-heartedness and, as a reluctant singleton, I understand why. Older daters are bowed down by baggage. They limp into what is intended to be a romantic rendezvous, prostrate with the burdens of divorce and disappointment.

Incapable of indulging in fanciful banter or saucy joshing, they mistake tales of betrayal, illness, bereavement and wretchedness for suitable first date conversation. The mood is sombre. The tone is dreary and downbeat.

Flirtation, badinage and entertainment are tragically lacking. Here’s the thing: I’ve never met you. I don’t know you. Don’t tell me about your mother’s dementia, your varicose veins or your bankruptcies.

Keep it merry and fluffy until I care about you. Then, when we are mutually attracted, gradually unleash the sad stuff gently and in small increments. Whimsy may seem twee and silly, but it’s a whole lot sexier than misery.

An embarrassing start to an enduring love affair

Easter brings out the best in gardeners. Daffodils, narcissi, tulips, hyacinths, camelias and crocuses are blooming fit to beat the band, and everything is still to play for. I am heartened by the record number of questions pouring into the Royal Horticultural Society from folk cottoning on to the fact that tilling the soil soothes our mental health and eating a home-grown tomato does magical things to our self-esteem.

My love affair with gardening began in pre-smartphone days. I had a few dog-eared books for reference, but couldn’t work out why my single apple tree, lovingly tended and watered, failed to bear fruit.

A simple Google would have told me you need to plant at least two different varieties to ensure pollination, and both must flower at the same time. Let’s just say apple crumble didn’t feature on the menu at Feltz Towers for an embarrassingly long time.