8:45 am, June 12, 2024
JLR has pledged more than £1m to support ‘proactive policing’ as the firm looks to help combat thefts of its vehicles.
The British firm has been rolling out a vast security programme over recent months in an attempt to tackle organised crime groups who have been targeting its models.
Last week Car Dealer reported how the outfit has increased its UK client care team to accelerate a security update roll-out for older vehicles, with the company also helping to ‘fund police port security’ to tackle gangs stealing its cars.
The latest investment will support several police forces with additional, dedicated resources to respond to vehicle thefts in hotspots across the country, as well as a new national policing unit to gather intelligence.
Specialist officers will have more capacity to investigate the crimes with pilot schemes already in operation with two police forces, who say they have resulted in stolen vehicles being recovered and arrests being made.
JLR also says it will be sharing vehicle location and telematics data with relevant authorities in order to aid prosecutions and recover vehicles.
Patrick McGillycuddy, Managing Director JLR UK, said: ‘We are constantly developing our systems and security features and through our close collaboration with police, we stay ahead of any emerging methods and quickly deploy anti-theft measures.
‘This additional investment, coupled with our other ongoing and proactive action, shows our commitment to supporting the authorities in having a tangible impact on combating this issue in the UK.’
Both Range Rover and Range Rover Sport models remain attractive targets for thieves and criminal gangs, with owners of JLR vehicles seeing their insurance premiums rocketing due to the rise in criminal activity.
To combat this, JLR recently announced that it is to give customers £150 a month for up to three years towards insuring new Range Rover and Range Rover Sport models as part of an ongoing battle to tackle exorbitant premiums.
As a result, the issue has adversely affected the value of used Jaguar Land Rover models, with prices of older models tumbling last year.
Despite this, JLR’s efforts do appear to be working with boss Adrian Mardell saying that the number of Range Rovers stolen has fallen 27% in recent months.
The number of stolen Range Rovers discovered was down almost half (49%), in 2023, compared to 2022.
