'Brought it on themselves!' Eamonn Holmes takes aim at Asda enforcing facial recognition CCTV to tackle shoplifting: 'No sympathy'

If the automated system identifies a match, a member of Asda's head office security team can alert the store within seconds.

Defending the move, Asda's chief commercial officer Liz Evans said: "The rise in shoplifting and threats and violence against shop workers in recent years is unacceptable and as a responsible retailer we have to look at all options to reduce the number of offences committed in our stores and protect our colleagues."

Discussing the decision on GB News, Breakfast host Eamonn Holmes declared he had "no sympathy" for the big supermarkets, despite the shoplifting epidemic.

In a scathing rant, Eamonn fumed: "These big shops have brought this on themselves. I watched a documentary on this last week and they were walking around asking the question, why are people shoplifting? Why are more people shoplifting?

"Well, why do you think? It was a bloomin' obvious question. Obviously, people are broke, things are really, really expensive. It doesn't explain every piece of shoplifting, but I think it explains a lot of it."

Offering sympathy for the small businesses and independent shops, Eamonn added that he has "very little sympathy" for big chain stores which "complain" about the level of shoplifting taking place.

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He told GB News: "I have very little sympathy. I have sympathy for people who run a corner shop and newsagents, but department stores and big shops - I don't have the same sympathy for it, because they have brought this about themselves.

"I don't want to pack my own groceries, it's not my job, it's your job. I'm spending a lot of money with you, why can't you do it for me? And then they complain that some people are sticking a cabbage up their shirt."

Delivering her verdict on the move by Asda, commentator Paula London said the best way to tackle shoplifting is to "put people back on the tills", instead of relying on people to not steal at self checkouts.

London said: "At the moment there's so much shoplifting going on, it's prolific. But I think the best thing that they can do would be to put people back on the tills again, and that will cut shoplifting hugely.

"But in the meantime, facial recognition is great if you've got nothing wrong. I don't think it's a problem, but we could go down a dangerous path. We don't want to end up like China, where everyone is being watched all throughout the day."

Criticising the operation of self checkouts, London added that rather than serving customers, staff are either "staring at customers" because they "don't trust them" or they are "gassing with each other".

London told GB News: "What I find so annoying is when I'm in a supermarket using the self checkout and then someone staring at me, and I just feel like if you don't trust me to do this, you can just serve me. But they don't want to serve. They just seem to want to stare at you.

"They're just standing around gassing to each other, or staring at you with their eyes in your head."

The trial is taking place at Asda's Ashton, Chadderton, Eastlands, Harpurhey and Trafford Park branches.

After the two-month period, the supermarket will assess the results to determine whether the technology should be implemented more widely.