CITS POLICE TRAINING EVENT HELD AT FLANNERY PLANT HIRE, DARLINGTON
The Combined Industry Theft Solutions (CITS) group, in partnership with police and industry partners, held the final police training event of 2026 at leading UK plant hirer, Flannery’s new depot in Darlington.
On the 29th of September 2026, police and leading security experts from industry came together for a one-day special training event.
The event was opened by CITS Chairman and the Clancy Groups head of security, Ian Elliott.
As part of the day, Input was given by specialist officers including Chris Piggott and Andrew Huddleston from the National Construction and Agricultural Theft Team (NCATT) and Police liaison officers of the official CESAR security marking Scheme. As well as input from Kirsty Hyslop, NFU Mutual’s vehicle crime and MI Specialist, John Mussett security expert of Radius, Group head of security, Seumas Ascott of J Murphy & Son’s and head of security, Dave Byng of Balfour Beatty.
The specialist event welcomed over 60 police officers from regional and specialist police forces. These invaluable events are aimed to highlight the current threats and the im-portance of working in partnerships to tackle crime, in particular to the construction and agricultural sectors. The events are also supported by the Home Office industry scheme, CESAR, which helps identify ownership of plant and machinery used on both farms and con-struction sites. The official scheme is fitted as standard by all leading manufacturers and has now fitted over 725,000 systems since it was launched nearly 20 years ago.
At the event officers also had the opportunity to learn about the new RAPID (Registered As-set Police Information Database) search application, which is a powerful web-based search tool designed to significantly enhance the speed and efficiency of plant and machinery iden-tification.
The event was also supported by the National Construction and Agricultural Theft Team (NCATT) who have recovered to date over £47,558,556.92 worth of equipment.
As part of the work of the National Rural crime Team, BBC Country File attended and filmed an interview with Andrew Huddleston, about the growing issues of organised crime within the agricultural sector, this will be aired on the programme in a few weeks’ time.
Ian Elliott CITS Chairman commented on the success of the day,
“Construction and agricultural equipment theft continues to be a significant problem.
These training events are invaluable to forces especially in times of scarce resource. We are extremely grateful to the Contsruction Equipment Association who own the CESAR scheme and fund these events. At CITS we promote a partnership approach to help deter theft in our sectors and these events are proof of the success of industry working together.”
Gareth Corbett, Director at Flannery Plant hire commented,
“Construction and agricultural equipment theft continues to have a significant impact on our industry, our clients, and the communities we work in. That’s why Flannery is proud to support this CITS Police training event alongside the National Construction and Agricultural Theft Team
By hosting the event at our Darlington depot, we’re helping bring police forces and industry together to share intelligence, improve detection techniques, and give officers the practical knowledge needed to identify stolen plant and disrupt organised criminal activity. Collaboration is essential if we’re going to reduce theft across the sector, and we’re fully committed to playing our part in that effort.”
Andrew Huddleston KPM, Head of the Police National Rural Crime Unit and National Construction and Agricultural Theft Team, said,
“Without the training, we would not have had officers with the knowledge to aid some of the recent recovery jobs that our unit have been tasked with and the officers would not have the willingness to get involved in helping tackle machinery theft. Put simply, CITS training events work in tackling crime in our sectors.”
CITS work in partnership with police, crime-fighting organisations and machinery manufacturers to provide officers with the knowledge and detection techniques to combat equipment theft, in order to be one step ahead of the criminals. The CITS training events are invaluable to aid police in recovering more stolen equipment.
CITS is an industry forum comprising of representatives from the Home Office, Police, Insurers and Industry will continue to host a series of further, free to attend, police only training events in 2027. Officers should register their interest for future events with faye@cits.uk.com
Further details can be found on the CITS website www.cits.uk.com
