FOI 955-2025 / Sep 2025 / Thefts of agricultural vehicles & equipment
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: 955-2025
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 23rd September 2025 as follows:
FOI scope: aggregated counts for calendar years 2019-2024. Please return as CSV or XLSX and include a brief data dictionary.
Required table (one row per year). Please supply counts for these fields:
Year
number_of_reports_tractors_stolen
number_of_tractors_recovered
number_of_reports_combines_harvesters_stolen
number_of_combines_recovered
number_of_reports_telehandlers_stolen
number_of_telehandlers_recovered
number_of_reports_trailers_stolen
number_of_trailers_recovered
number_of_reports_quads_atvs_stolen
number_of_quads_atvs_recovered
number_of_reports_gps_domes_stolen (roof receivers)
number_of_reports_gps_displays_stolen (in-cab displays/consoles)
number_of_gps_units_recovered (total recovered across domes & displays)
total_estimated_value_of_equipment_stolen_gbp (if recorded)
police_operation_names (e.g., Operation Walrus)
notes (optional explanatory text)
If the force does not record the dome/display split, please provide gps_units_total and note this limitation.
If locating all years or fields would exceed the cost/time limit, please contact me within 5 working days with a recommended narrowed scope (for example 2022-2024 only or tractors + gps_units_total). Partial delivery (e.g., 2022-2024) is welcome while earlier years are compiled.
Please state whether the counts are "reported incidents" (calls/reports) or "recorded crimes".
Please find the Warwickshire Police response set out below.
Response: Please be advised that the requested information is not centrally recorded and is therefore not held in a readily retrievable format. There is no specific offence for theft of tractor, combine harvester, telehandler, trailer, quad, or GPS, or for agricultural equipment in general, and no flag or marker to easily identify where these items may be involved in a crime. Keyword searches are not carried out routinely as they are not reliable, they will only bring back records where the chosen keyword(s) is present within the MO Description / Incident Summary of an investigation; these are limited free text fields and do not contain all information in relation to an investigation. Therefore, in order to determine a response to this request, it would be necessary to individually review the wider investigation records for all offences where such equipment could feasibly be reported stolen on an individual basis. This would include theft, burglary and robbery offences, which on average would total around 10,000 records annually. As you will appreciate, manual review of this number of crimes would take an inordinate amount of time and would be above the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e., the cost of locating and retrieving the requested information, exceeds the ‘appropriate level’ as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
In accordance with Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a Refusal Notice for this request.
In accordance with Section 16 of the Act, I have a duty to provide advice and assistance on refining your request; however, due to the volume of records that would need to be individually reviewed, I am unable to suggest a way to reduce the request into one that could be managed within the fees limit.
Your attention is drawn to the below which details your right of complaint.
Should you have any further enquiries concerning this matter, please write or email the Freedom of Information Unit quoting the reference number above.
Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Officer
Freedom of Information Unit
Warwickshire Police
PO Box 4
Leek Wootton
Warwickshire
CV35 7QB