Crime: Lies and statistics
For a decade and more I have been covering crime statistics and reporting how crime is going down but that people don't believe it.
Reading this now, you are likely not to believe it because two thirds of adults in England and Wales remain convinced it is actually going up.
At least they believe crime is rising nationally but, interestingly, two thirds think crime is falling or stable in their local area [pdf].
But should we trust the figures?
Well, there are two main arguments. The first is that the figures are lies, manufactured by corrupt politicians. This conspiracy theory requires us to believe that literally thousands of professional statisticians, police officers, academics and civilian staff are fiddling the data for no personal gain and in some cases risking professional suicide. I have met no-one who has produced a shred of evidence that the numbers have been got at.
The second argument is that the numbers don't reflect reality, that somehow huge amounts of crime is being committed but not counted. To counter this concern, there are two measures of crime - police records and the British Crime Survey which asks people their experience of crime.
Police figures go up and down depending on police activity. Crime may not be reported. But the crime survey gets round this problem by asking individuals what has happened to them.
It is regarded as the most robust survey on any subject in the country - tens of thousands of respondents and with a remarkably high completion rate. The survey has gaps - critically it doesn't talk to under-16s but other survey work has done and the trends don't change much. Anyway, it would require truly enormous amounts of crime against children to counteract the trends of crime against adults and there is no evidence that that is the case.
The survey has other gaps too - because it talks to human victims it misses crimes against businesses and institutions, notably fraud. For the same reason, it doesn't contain information on murders.
However, it is important to note that the story of police recorded crime and people's experience of crime mirror each other - again good evidence that we are witnessing something that has not been manufactured or spun.
There is another reason to think the figures are telling us something real - crime figures have fallen in almost every developed Western nation over almost exactly the same period - from the mid-nineties.
This is a phenomenon that crosses borders, continents and seems unaffected by criminal justice policy. The United States and Canada have very different ideas about the value of imprisonment in controlling crime. But both countries have experienced big falls.
American cities that practised zero tolerance have seen similar reductions in crime to cities that did not.
So why do people refuse to believe the numbers? In part, because crime sells newspapers. Broadcasters are not blind to its effect on ratings either. Perhaps we are less tolerant of crime and bad behaviour these days. Certainly we are less trusting of each other, which is likely to make us feel more nervous about the risk of crime.
If one accepts that crime really has fallen, the next question is 'why?'
Criminologists, with refreshing candour, say they don't know. They've got theories and so have I. The fall coincides with a period of economic growth, but then crime rose during the boom of the sixties. Stuff is harder to steal - anti-theft devices on cars and homes has contributed to big falls in these volume crimes. Consumer goods like TVs and DVD recorders are so cheap these days they are hardly worth nicking.
Demographic change means there are fewer young men, the group responsible for most crime. Police have become much more sophisticated in fighting crime with profiling and mapping systems aided by new technology.
All of these may be true, but I am not sure it all adds up to an explanation. I don't think human beings are getting nicer but nor do I think the statistics are getting nastier.
I'm 
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Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt present an interesting explanaition for the crime drop in the US in their book Freakonomics.
They suggest that it can be traced back to the legalisation of abortion. The number of unwanted children living in poverty started to drop as abortion became available and they are the group most likely to fall into criminal behaviour. The drops in crime correspond to the time when this cohort group would be entering it's late teens/early twenties which are the most productive years for a criminal.
Adam Smith's "hidden hand of the market" at work.
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My partner is a recently retired police officer of 30 years service. He himself has admitted that the way statistics are recorded are for political purposes. In the last week for instance my mother had her purse stolen whilst at a bus stop however this is recorded as "Lost" not stolen - the station officer admitted that due to no proof (not counting that two people "lost" their purses at the same location) it would be recorded as lost not stolen. My mothers credit card was unsuccessfully used within 15 mins of being stolen. This does not give confidence in statistics. My case rests!
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On the same day that the BBC run a story in which the Government say crime is going down, they also run a story which shows a whole army of illegal immigrants living and working in the UK, without the Police seeming to have a clue about it.
What faith can we put in crime statistics cobbled together by this Government? I look forward to the next lot of statistics.
"Crime is down 50%, tractor production is up 120%"
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For starters if you report a crime and don't get an incident number you've got no way of knowing if the police have recorded the crime. The government sets strict targets for police to solve crimes. If every reported crime that will never be solved is recorded the police force in question would be in real trouble for failing to resolve the majority of crimes reported. The current system is simply not conducive to accurately reporting the state of the country, it's just good for generating sound bites so the government can pretend everything is alright.
I see criminal activity on the streets every day, and there's definitely more of it now than just 5 years ago. I don't care what the statistics have been massaged to say, crime is definitely on the rise.
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The actual reporting of a crime has been made so much more dificult by the police. Of course minor crime reporting has fallen because there is little point in making the report as the clear up rate is so appauling. The officers taking the information involve you in a beurocretic process which means that one loses the will to live. Many people therefore do not report crimes
I believe that this is a strategy to achieve what we have seen today!
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May I may one of the few people to actually believe these statistics.
As for the anecdotal evidence about lost purses in the comments - let me ask you this question: Has the way police record crimes like this changed in the last 5/10 years? If not, surely such crimes would not have been recorded 5/10 years ago.
Indeed let me suggest, with all the paperwork police complain about nowadays, crime has never been better recorded.
If every available statistic says crime is going down, I'm inclined to believe it. Regardless of certain individuals experiences.
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People don't believe the numbers as we've had decades of both Tory and Labour governments cooking the books to make themselves look better.
For example, between 2002 and 2006 recorded violent crime dropped 14% according to the British Crime Survey, yet at the same time hospitals saw a 30% increase in hospital admissions due to assault (Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, Bellis, John Moores University).
This figures simply don't jibe, so either a lot of people are lying about being assaulted when they haven't, or alternatively the figures from the BCS do not accurately display the rates of crime.
Personally, I'm of the opinion that the keyword is 'recorded' and that increasing amounts of crime simply goes unreported - gang members might have some uncomfortable questions to answer if they went to the police with a complaint.
Whilst for 'lesser' crimes many people will only bother with the police if they need do so for insurance requirements, as its increasingly obvious the police are either unable or unwilling to do their job.
For example, a month or so back a friend of mine had his car damaged, he called the police and they simply suggested it was self inflicted. Result, he now knows better than to inform the police unless absolutely necessary.
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MonkeyBot5000
That is a chilling correlation and I hope it's not causal. The idea of giving the poorest in society access to abortion to reduce crime is terrifying. Well... to me anyway.
I am of the opinion that crime is falling but most of the people I know or hear talking won't share that view. A lot of people won't trust statistics regardless of where they come from. They just dismiss it as government spin. Even the comments here of people who've read your article still mirror the perpetual state of mistrust of statistics, which I thought your report answered pretty well.
Good work Mark, even if most people don't appreciate it.
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How can we believe it? I don't, not when the prisons are packed and every other day somewhere we hear that more people are being stabbed and killed. Sometimes 4 in a day; I do not believe it's going down, I don't rely on statistics I'm afraid. Fathers have to be more responsible and parents have to know where their teenagers are ALL of the time;
IllustriousFrisby
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frank-castle makes a very good point i think. there was a similar argument recently - though not as well publicised - about road accidents - a large discrepancy between what the police said, and what hospital admissions said. i understand the DfT is currently working to square this circle. Perhaps the same needs to be done about - violent - crime too.
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Mark
"Criminologists, with refreshing candour, say they don't know."
That's the hallmark of good science - admitting when you don't know. Only then can you begin to find out the right answer.
Oh, and being very careful about interpreting anecdotal "evidence", no matter how tragic and heartfelt it is.
I also believe the figures, with reservations and caveats about variability. As you say, the similar trends in the USA and Canada are striking. And crime can quite easily be going up in "hot spots" and down overall.
But that does not sell newspapers in the same way as "blade menace spreads to rural areas" or "feral kids knife outrage".
It'll be interesting in a few years to see whether abandoning or at least reducing central targets on police rcord-keeping etc. makes a difference...
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THE CRIME FIGURES
The government would be well advised not to be fooled by the drop in reported crime, nor persist in the patronising attitude that they know the reality while ?the common people? are mislead by the high-profile treatment of some violent crimes.
[a] There may well be an actual drop in crime, because many people have given up hope of living in a country where the rule of law applies and have adapted their behaviour accordingly. This would acount for the trend that Mark has noted across the prosperous "west". Thatcherism and its US conterparts was accompanied by a widening gulf between the rich and the poor, and this has been physical involving the displacement of people "across the tracks" and also an investment in much more personal security- including traceable mobile phones. This has also given social exclusion a more physical expression.
As recent figures show, the people most likely to suffer from knife crime are young people. Well! Who else spends time on the street these days? Already when I was teaching in the Brixton area 20 years ago parents whenever possible ferried their daughters around until the girls were old enough to pass a driving test and then they bought them a car hoping to minimise the risk. Even in the fairly green and suburban area where we have lived for 30 years my 62 year old wife does not feel able to go out for an evening stroll. She tried it last week and was frequently accosted by men in cars.. Do people not listen when they are told that ordinary people feel hesitant about going about their ordinary business as they were accustomed to do? .. There are obvious strategies that people can employ to reduce the risks of becoming a victim of crime, and thus contribute to a fall in crime statistics.
[b] This low expectation from the forces of law and order also fosters a culture in which people are reluctant to report crimes unless they are ones that are actually linked to property that is insured. An insurance company will usually not pay out for a case of theft if no theft has been reported. But apart from that circumstance bothering to report low level crime will just clog up the system to no obvious point. We are all busy people these days and have better things to do than merely waste time going through formal procedures. I wonder how many people approached for the crime survey were like me and decided that they did not want to spend time doing a survey- the kind of thing that telephone marketing is doing all the time.
Estimates for non-reported crime vary, but everyone agrees that there is a level; and it presumably varies amongst other things with the current estimation of the active level of concern with the lot of the citizen. The general luke-warm reaction to the decision not to put another 2p on to petrol tax is one more example of the way that the present government is seen as reacting too late- like the police who arrive when there is nothing really that they can do.
There is a growing street perception of a pretty useless and incompetent country, not least among young and socially marginalised young people who are accustomed to see adults as mere older teenagers and of no real help when they themselves are in trouble- hence the blade- that at least is something solid.
Casseroleon Norbury London
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The observation that crime is considered to be static falling locally and rising nationally is exactly duplicated when people are asked about the state of the NHS, and probably other similar entities I am not aware of. I suspect that this is because national perceptions are skewed by the media (routinely negative, almost crushingly so) but local perceptions are not because there is massive under-reporting of local events - since when was there routine coverage of council meetings or magistrates' court sessions, for example? - and people actually report what they perceive directly.
Some of the responses are depressing. For example, taking "X happened to me" or "I saw Y going on" and then blowing it up into a meditation on the state of the nation is such a common, cheap trick of newspaper columnists it should probably be named the "journalistic fallacy"!
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It's interesting to read in another related article on this site that knife crime in Glasgow has been endemic since the 1920s. I can't recall this ever being headline news. As has happened many times, the media get hysterical when trends that may have been commonplace elsewhere suddenly hit London.
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I do agree with you Mark, and I like how the BBC is the only media outlet trying to fight the crime wave sensationalism, but even though I want to believe there is less crime (and I do - I think it's hype over an issue that's always been there and restricted to certain areas) - statistics are manipulated, the police and statisticians do not fiddle them or anything but the criteria are simply changed by the administration to show whatever they want
Obvious example is unemployment, change the definition of unemployment to those on JSA, which was restricted, and the numbers of 'unemployed' tumble without any real change - so people naturally see a report saying crime has fallen and wonder what criteria do they use, is it simply less crime is reported? the issue is trust here, and people don't trust statistics while they remain a political weapon that is spun to support everybody's view - look at the scottish nationalists, constantly saying they give more than they receive, while the unionists use the same data to say the exact opposite - it's ridiculous
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I have recently retired from the Police Service as a civilian looking after a busy Police Station Office. The National Crime Recording criteria has changed dramatically over the years, so that many former offences have been decriminalised or are not recorded at all. Stolen purses are now recorded as lost if there is no concrete proof, criminal damage and grafitti is often not recorded at all! This government continues to manipulate crime figures and the public do well to distrust them.
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crime rates reported may be officially going down, but we all know that to report most crimes that are now deemed trivial, is a waste of time which will recieve no police attention. We all now deem once reportable crimes as trivial in the scope of the problems which we all now face and as such dont bother to report these crimes. When i used the new on-line crime reporting site for the Metropolitan Police, that did not even generate a crime number, therefore it is officially not a statistic. It took several months of repeatedly more irate emails before i recieved a call apologising for the crime not becoming a statistic and then offerring me the opportunity to re-register the original crime!
I wonder how many crimes are reported on-line instead of queing at the police station with all the criminals being dealt with there and all the friends of those people waiting and intimidating those that attend to report crimes?
Reporting crime has become a difficult thing to do and i reckon that non-reported crime figures are the real reason for falls in reported crime and not an efficient Policing system!
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Crime statistics are supposedly reducing because victims no longer bother to report crimes to the police, as the chance of them being properly investigated and criminals being brought to justice are nil.
My parents suffered a terrible burglary but did not even report it to the police - crime statistics are falling because many more people are doing the same. The police are seen my many ordinary people as costly (via council tax) and completely ineffectual.
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The Nu Labour nannies will no doubt have "massaged" the figures.
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Excellent article.
I just cant understand a lot of the comments on here that say they dont believe it... "not when the prisons are packed and every other day somewhere we hear that more people are being stabbed and killed."
This is the whole point of the article! Mark Easton is trying to point out that the press (and other media) are aware that crime sells... so it's splashed on the front pages of every newspaper in town! Its the easy money-maker for the editors and people are lapping it up.
There might be nigh on 60 million people in the country, but a few knife attacks in London are blown up as a national epidemic, and people in cities like Exeter, Aberdeen, York and all over the country no longer think their community is safe.
I know that you can't trust everything that politicians say, but then why think the press is 100% truthful? They are a money making enterprise, whose goal is sales... and which paper would sell more "Crime is dropping" or "Knife attacks are out of control".
The key thing that Mark Easton points out is that we have a survey - the British Crime Survey - that does not rely on which crimes were recorded or how they were recorded(as some correspondents above argued is the reason for the drop).
Instead it asks people about their experience of crime. As the article states: "Police figures go up and down depending on police activity. Crime may not be reported. But the crime survey gets round this problem by asking individuals what has happened to them... It is regarded as the most robust survey on any subject in the country."
And it shows that crime is falling!
But - in a country the size of ours - there will always be murders, stabbings, burglaries, etc, and they will always be on the front pages of the newspapers. Consequently, on a daily basis, people will read about crimes (sometimes gruesome, sometimes scary) committed all around the country. And if they read and hear about it all the time, the fear of crime just grows and grows.
I just wish that people could see that what they see in the newspapers is not "The Truth", but just a newspaper-selling version of it.
Crime is dropping, but the fear of crime is growing. Why? Because fear sells papers.
Thank you Mark for a balanced piece of journalism.
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If I were a super cop I could supply you with between 30 - 50 instances of car crime including speeding and dangerous driving which for various reasons go unreported in a two hour period on the A55 alone!
I once witnessed a large group of 14 - 15 yr olds picking on a single lad in car park they started punching him and I felt really frightened, alas to my shame I did nothing to help that lad. Surely it must be asked how many other such crimes go unreported because large gangs rule the streets?
I often see large gangs on youths roaming the streets where years before youth were much less intimidating. If you say something to a mischievous gang you wonder "will I be the next tragic news item?" I think people have given up reporting some crimes due to a lack of faith in the police's ability to bring the culprits to justice and the fear of reprisals. If I may just conclude with one last thought, I believe that youths no longer fear justice or respect the admonitions of adults because they know very well that adults have no power over them, in short, years ago strong communities did the work of the police force. You now have 60,000 policemen and women struggling to prevent, catch and record crime as well as attend court! If you ask me you would be better off releasing 60,000 minor criminals and employ an extra 60,000 ? 100,000 police and have a policeman/woman on every corner and prevent crime
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I think we should just abolish the police force altogether - that way there'd be nobody to collect crime statistics at all, which means of course that there won't be any crime. Perhaps then Mark might venture out into the real world instead of classing himself as an expert on it by simply by looking at numbers?
I'm sure that in the absence of any crime figures or police, everyone will feel much safer because the media won't have anything to "sensationalise" will they?
Once again, the sheer amount of denial voiced in this blog is breathtaking. I suspect everyone also believes that school leavers are growing ever more intelligent because the percentages of GCSE and A level passes continue to rise?
The past 11 years of government can be summed up as a bunch of incompetents hell-bent on giving the impression that they're solving problems, rather than actually solving problems.
To sit back after all this time and dismiss the concerns of an entire nation as "media sensationalism" simply because some government-produced statistics say otherwise is naivety of truly staggering proportions - but then you'd never realise that if you spent all your time sat inside looking at statistics instead of living in the real world. If we've really got nothing to worry about then why the hell are members of the cabinet scared to go out in their own constituencies without bodyguards and stab-vests? Oh yes, sorry, that's right, do as you say, not as you do.
As many people have already pointed out, most crimes these days go unreported, because the police are too busy to do anything about it. Has Mark ever dialled 999 to be told by the operator that sorry, the police are too busy to come round?
11 years of massive investment and insanely high taxes, and all we have to show for it are a load of statistics that tell us everything's OK.
The disassociation of politics from the real world has never been greater, and the single biggest reason for this is because this government has given up on trying to serve the people and instead has focussed all its efforts on producing statistics that demonstrate it's success. Then it blames the media for reporting events in the real world and has the nerve to call the public gullible for not believing the government-sponsored line on things.
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On my way home from work some months ago I saw a drug-deal taking place on the edge of an industrial estate. I telephoned the local police information number and they argued with me that I had seen no such thing. I did give them a car registration number which they said they would note for future reference.
The reality is that the crime continues but the police don't want to know about it. They have surrendered the streets and the public at large to the criminal classes and are ignoring the consequences secure in the knowledge that the political class will support their indifference.
The public has given up reporting crime because the authorities only express an interest when it is time to raise some more taxes from the public.
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Mattexe
I think you've got it bang on. The BCS has nothing to do with the police and according to Mark Easton's report correlates with it pretty well. This means that all the comments about police not recording crime properly or reclassifying crimes are blown out of the water.
Sorry guys but the numbers, while not perfect will always be better than any one person's perception.
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Mark, Several points here.
You put your finger on the main weakness of the British Crime Survey. It does not talk to children. A huge amount of crime involves children these days, either as victims or perpetrators.
In reality, I know that crime is higher than the government figures.
From my own experience, I have been the victim of crime on a number of occasions over the last few years. I have reported precisely none of these to the Police. It was not worth the time or effort.
The Police have reached a point of such complete and total indiference to what is happening on the streets that they do absolutely nothing in response to calls.
From speaking to people, I am aware I am not alone. Start a conversation about crime with anyone, and when they mention an instance, ask "Did you report it?" Most often, the answer is no.
The Police figures are only scratching the surface of UK crime.
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Crime not being reported must be a major factor in these figures.
There is no point in reporting a crime if nothing is done.
When I was attacked I contacted the police, I found out who he was, his address, and nothing was done.
People are living behind heavily locked doors, only going out in daylight, the elderly are the most at risk.
The criminals have the upper hand.
The police are getting beaten up, never mind the credit crunch, the biggest problem is the law abiding being terrorised in their communities.
If we try to protect ourselves we end up in court, we need to have a system that puts these criminals out of the community they have harmed.
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All news papers and TV are formed in the belief that the public only want to read about bad news and failures. This mis-conception has led us into a world where nearly all press is written with a negative view.
What this attitude does is actually irritates the public as the 'gossip of the street' (the media) prattle on about how outrageous and morally wrong everything is - but always about subjects which the readers - or viewers, can do nothing about.
Knife crime is a perfect example of this. This morning I woke up to hear an interview on the radio with a selection of 'knife carrying hoodies'. They were clearly stating the reason for carrying a knife was 'kill or be killed'.
The constant exaggeration of the media has created this attitude. I can remember being a 'yooof' and at that age you will often look for any excuse to 'look rebellious'. That coupled with the impression the media give, which is 'there's a knife man on every street corner' - makes it a very dangerous cocktail of anger, frustration and incomplete truths.
Since this latest media trand started, I have noticed "teenage stabbings" now covers anyone from the age of 6 to 30, any place in the country and under any circumstances (domestic, muggings, gang fights etc)
What started out as a local inner city problem has now been blown out of all proportion by the out of control media.
The reality is that the majority of the 56 million or so people that live in this country are highly unlikely to be a victim of knife crime. I remember a similar situaiton played with the street violence figures. Over a few years these were on the increase and the media blew up the stories to make every elderly person in the country afraid to go out.
When you actually dug into the figures, it was clear that the most likely victims were 'young males aged 18 - 25 on a Friday or Saturday night in town' - when over 90% of the violent assaults took place.
As I know a journalist (al-beit a sports one), he has shown me the original text of an interview he sent in to the paper - he then showed me the actuall article as it appeared in the Daily Mail. The one sentence the player made about an argument with his manager within the context of a specific incident was picked up and the whole article was based around "xxxxx falls out with manager". This put him in a very awkward position with the player as he felt the trust had been broken.
If the media simply stuck to the truth, we wouldn't end up in a grey and boring world, what would happen is people would realise how many beautiful things there are in this world and would have far less worries and concerns.
However there is an argument that this is part of an overall 'control game' - because it's much easier to herd sheep that fear the sheepdog, than sheep who show no fear.
I'm sure as a journailst Mark you will appreciate what I am saying. Every person in the role of reporting a story has a responsibility to the truth - this has been lost over the years and sensationalism rules.
The danger is if we continue to operate as we are currently the violence on the streets will get worse as more and more people attempt to defend themselves against the 'enemy who doesn't exist'. Wildly swinging about after shadows will result in innocent people getting hurt.
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27. At 2:45pm on 18 Jul 2008, TheresOnly1Soupey wrote:
?The reality is that the majority of the 56 million or so people that live in this country are highly unlikely to be a victim of knife crime.
The danger is if we continue to operate as we are currently the violence on the streets will get worse as more and more people attempt to defend themselves against the 'enemy who doesn't exist'. Wildly swinging about after shadows will result in innocent people getting hurt.?
There are many people in this world who are determined to see, hear and think no evil.
Unfortunately sometimes reality is a bit hard to ignore, and they are forced to shut their eyes, stick their fingers in their ears and shout out loudly ?I CAN?T HEAR YOU. LA-LA-LA-LA-LA.?
T.O.1.Soupey is one of those people.
The reality is that the chances of one of the 60,587,300 (Census 2006) people in this country being the victim of knife crime is increasing all the time. Even the police?s inadequate figures admit this.
It is true that last year, 1 person in every 2,735 was the victim of knife crime.
In London however, 1 in every 933 people was the victim of knife crime last year.
That seems like a lot to me.
And it is going up.
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On thing these comments have taught me ? if I'm the victim of a crime I will definitely report it.
Nobody else seems to bother, so the police should be round lickety-split.
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uglyjohn #28,
I'm afraid you are one of those people who wants to believe what they are told because it's easier than actually finding out the truth.
Lets look at your stats:
1 person in every 2,735 was the victim of knife crime last year.
I see you got this from dividing the population by the number of knife crimes last year.
Straight away you have distorted the truth. This statistic does not take into account victims who have been the victim of knife crime more than twice last year (and trust me - there are many repeat attacks in those figures).
Also the phrase 'knife crime' can mean anything from a street stabbing where someone is killed, to a domestic incident where a wife throws a knife at her husband for being such an idiot.
As you can see, there is a very big difference in the 'dangers to the public' for those 2 crimes.
The figures you list for London are mis-leading for the same reasons.
With the ability to distort the truth like that - you should consider a career in journalism (if you haven't already) ;-o
I certainly do NOT stick my fingers in my ears and pretend the crimes are not happening. The very fact that I have been a victim of the 'press sensationalism' gives me a perfect insight you seem to be lacking.
When I was 22 I was attacked at a party with a hammer - I was hit a couple of times on the head. The police turned up to break up the party, but the perpatrators had already fled.
Now that statement conjours up all sorts of horrific scenes in your mind. as did it for the journalist who printed a story in the local paper describing how a 'man was attacked with a hammer at a party causing serious head injuries and requiring hospital attention'
The truth is that:
1) The hammer was a toffee hammer (and not a sledge / mallet as most people would immediately picture)
2) The hospital visit was recommended by the police - as all head injuries should - but they found nothing wrong, the bleeding stopped by itself and I went home the same night and slept it off.
The funniest part of this episode is that my mother read the story in the paper (not knowing it was me as they could not print my name - I hadn't been interviewed) and showed great concern. The next time I saw her she warned of the dangers of 'going out at night' and said I should 'stay away from parties like that'.
Imagine the scene when I told her it was me in the story - and then she spent a good 15 minutes looking at my head for permanent damage - in the end not believing it was me that the story was about.
Stories like this get picked up by national press and the 'best bits' picked out so eventually the whole story is completely out of context.
Imagine for a minute, you are a teenager in London at the moment. Everyone looks at you funny, no-one smiles at you, people actually cross the street to avoid you because they (like you) assume that 'knife crime is rife' - is there any wonder there is a feeling of hostility and resentment from that section of society which is going to spiral downwards? Is it any surprise that every 'yoof' feels they NEED to carry a knife?
Consider this uglyjohn - I don't know your demographic, but unless you're a inner city teenager - your most likely to die of:
a) Some form of cancer / lung disease / other long term illness - brought on by smoking, drinking, stress, car fumes, mobile phone masts, waste radiation......
b) Getting run over
c) Disease
There's a Wikipedia page (look up cause of death) that lists the 'most popular'. More people die from Measles (a preventable disease) than from the very broad class of 'violence'.
These are world figures too - so you have to consider all the violent and dangerous places in the world which distort these figures upwards.
Now what you really need to ask is why the media concentrate on such a small risk with such a large magnifying glass.
Have you considered it might be because if you worried about the 'real killers' then you would find the Government at the bottom of most of them (Harold McMillan - smoking + tax revenue).
That of course would upset the populous and maybe the houses of parliment would get burnt down.
No one in my close friends or family has ever died from being stabbed, shot or suffered any violent death - however I have now lost 7 to cancer, 1 was killed in a car accident and the rest were old age.
Look at your own family, and that of your neighbours - I think you'll find a similar pattern.
You'd be better off getting the local mobile phone mast pulled down, getting cars off the streets and looking at the links between stress and cancer than worrying about knife crime if you want to live for as long as possible.
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Nice one Theresonly1soupey
It's interesting to see people still banging on about police not reporting crimes when THE BRITISH CRIME SURVEY, WHICH HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE POLICE STILL SHOWS THAT CRIME HAS FALLEN.
However, I don't blame them. Endless media reports are always going to beat one yearly gathered statistic no matter how robust. I'm just waiting for the press to get bored of reporting stabbings so I don't have to skip reading them in the paper.
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It's all very well quoting the results of the British Crime Survey, but whom do they ask? I have never heard from them in my life and I have been a victim of crime. Many crimes go unreported because we know the police aren't interested. Many crimes are downgraded to massage the figures. There is probably no true, accurate figure of actual committed crimes year on year because of the constantly-changing goalposts. Today it seems the police often invent excuses for re-classifying a crime as merely an incident - that way the figures reflect well on them.
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The mention of the BCS begs many questions . What was the original sample size ? ; how many actually responded?; how were they selected ( if randomly then there is a chance of targeting someone who has had no experience of a crime)? ; what are the demographics of this sample ?; . The omissions of its sample respondents and crimes considered are major weaknesses in allowing it to be viewed as an accurate mirror .
The difference between the BCS and the police figures are that the police numbers are those recorded crimes . A lot of incidents are related to the police which never make it to full blown crimes - but these incidents must have been sufficiently serious enough for someone to report them . However there are large areas of some of our cities where insurance is well nigh impossible to obtain due to the high crime rate . Quite a lot of people play Russian roulette by not insuring themselves because of cost or not being able to insure at all. These are high crime areas and when a crime such as theft takes place no one reports it - why Insurance companies need crime numbers to settle with victims of crime - no insurance -no need for a crime number - no need to report it . Anyway it is unlikely to be investigated .
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Sorry, this is a smokescreen. The floor in this great announcement is that the statistics are in relation to REPORTED crime. In recent years the police are so bogged down in form filling and diversity conscious tip-toeing that more and more petty crimes are simply not taken as seriously as they once were. As a result fewer and fewer are actually reported. To receive comfort from these figures is at the very least misguided, and I am afraid, Mark, you have on this occasion been fooled.
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On the day the stats were released I was surprised that there was no Have your Say about it, nor has there been one since - while other less political stories have been subject to discussion. Unfortunately this adds weight to the idea that the figures are both wildly inacurrate and that the government (and BBC) don't want us making anything of them. On a personal level I have given up trying to report crimes in progess on several occasions whilst in a queuing system on the 999 service.
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I suggest you look into a crime pattern that is well identified, but not tracked by any law enforcement agency in the world. The "Express Kidnapping" typically begins as a home invasion or a carjacking from a parking lot. The victim is transported to an ATM where the first withdrawal occurs. If there is enough money still in the account, the victim is taken to a remote location, executed and the body hidden so the criminal can clean out the account. No one tracks the problem because it is classified as a form of aggravated robbery or kidnapping or murder, but the connection to the ATM is never exposed. Because most modern police forces use software called "Compstat" or something similar, this data could be easily captured. Compstat tracks crime by criminal code section and address. If the police had a master list of all ATM addresses in their city, they could capture data going back decades revealing how many murders, rapes, robberies, carjackings, home invasions and missing persons there have been. But, you can imagine how happy the banking industry would be to see that exposed. Contact me, as there is much more to tell.
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The clue is in the term "Recordable Crimes" it is just propoganda.
Crime is on the increase and like millions of others I would not waste my time reporting it to the Police.
The only crimes anyone I know would bother to report are those where they need a crime reference number for an insurance claim.
Like inflation statistics can be made to prove what you like.
Luxury technilogical items that become cheaper naturally like 40" plasma TV's are used to negate the increases of 20% on fuel and basic food necessities.
LIES DAMN LIES AND STATISTICS!
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If crime has gone down, why, when I watch the news everyday has a murder or a stabbing happened.
In the statistics as people are all too aware are incidents which the government as decreed are not recorded as a "crime". My hubby reported vandalism the other day where actual damage was caused. It took the police two days to see him and then they were only interested in why the vandals had been on the property, not the actual damaged caused. Who paid for repairs, hubby did of course as this government EXPECTS people to do.
Thanks Mr Bliar (no spelled it right) and Mr Brown the modern day opposites of Robin Hood and the perfect Sheriffs of Nottingham
But more like Nero and we all know what he did
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Another factor that has come up obliquely in this debate is the hidden criminality that was bound to happen when the government imposed the minimum wage. Though this might be considered as a just and laudable innovation like the attempt to make a more moral USA during the Prohibition Era, any such attempt to impose on people using the authority of the state in a way that they consider to be unreasonable is likely to lead to "criminalisation" of what was formerly normal; and with it a deflection of formerly "legal activity" into a darker world that can be exploited by criminals.
As has been pointed out several times these crime statistics only count recorded crime- which presupposes crimes which produce victims who will report them.
But as the recent BBC investigation in Southall showed there is an incredible amount of crime that is going on which is not being reported. People who are employing illegal workers are not going to report them: nor are houseowners who are only too glad that the work is not costing them as much as they feared; the migrant workers too probably never expected to earn a "British living wage" since they are usually trying to live as cheaply as possible and send money back home to their families, or to the gangs that brought them here.
And British workers are probably not going to "shop" this criminal activity because they do not want to do these "cheap" and intensive jobs anyway. Far better to sign on.
Casseroleon
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If crime is falling why are there record numbers of people in prison? Surely there should be a correlation.
The figure also does not reflect the number of elderly people who do not go out after dark due to fear of crime.
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re: 40 - the easy answer is population has only been increasing, prison places are a set number rather than based on a percentage of the population, if crime rate stayed the same but the population grew = more prisoners
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BCS has nothing to do with reported crime. Has a sample of 50,000, stratified, with extra 16-24 year-olds to allow for non-response amongst younger people. it is compiled by statisticians rather than politicians.
I guess people will just carry on believing the tabloids though, it'd be a shame to let the facts get in the way of the 'truth', wouldn't it?
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"The figure also does not reflect the number of elderly people who do not go out after dark due to fear of crime."
----
Well, again, this is what happens when you believe too much press scaremongering. What does that have to do with the figures?
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Sinkvenice
To answer your question- The connection between people taking action to avoid putting themselves at risk of experiencing crime and the crime statistics falling is surely fairly obvious.
When people consciously avoid something- it will usually decline.
And there have been several campaigns to highlight just how to invite criminal attention- and therefore what not to do- including a number of entertaining TV commercials. In fact , in so far as such "education" can be counted as part of a successful anti-crime strategy the government can claim that such spending has been worthwhile. But that would still mean that a fall in crime was being realised by a changes in behaviour by the public and a resultant fall in crime - not by any improved performance by the forces of law and order in deterring crime, which has been the function of our uniformed police from the first Bobbies.
As for the credibility of the police, the news that the Armed forces is looking at the possibility of recruiting in Jamaica, is a reminder of the way that police recruitment has changed in the twin interests of political correctness and the need to get and keep the numbers we need. Unfortunately back in the bad old days when policing started policemen needed to have a minimum required physical presence, and the famous helmet - like many warrior head-dresses sought to give an impression of further height. Sadly, people who are minded to do bad things will often need to be confronted by a physical presence that they have to take seriously- and this will probably apply to "street cred" appraisals. I recall some pupils coming out of a school assembly in which they had been introduced to a new Deputy Head- who was a dimunitive women of five feet. One girl laughed dismissively " Did you see her? If she tried to tell me off, I would just lick her down."
We may not like this reality, but having smaller police strengthens the case for narrowing the disparity of power between the police and the members of the public that they have to deal with by means of weapons. Apparently the incident in Croydon that has already been mentioned resulted in the officers having to resort to pepper spray and battons; but when we are trying to tell young people that they should not carry weapons, it is unfortunate that British police have to carry weapons.
Casseroleon
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My company looks after many commercial properties mostly in Luton and Stevenage. We have experienced more and more vandalism and intimidation of staff over the past few years. Previously we reported all vandalism to the police now we no longer bother as the police never come out and we do not need an incident number as we no longer claim on the insurance. We have hours of cctv footage showing gangs of lads destroying our property but no one is interested in seeing it let alone arresting them.
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In his posthumously published autobiography the American writer Mark Twain claimed that the nineteenth century UK Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli had once told him that "there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and staistics".
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For me it's really difficult to believe in the police statistics.
I've been living and working in the UK for 3 years and in this time:
- once a flat I was living in was broken into and laptop stolen. The police sent a technician to collect fingerprints, a letter offering counsel for the victims of crime - and that was that. No police office came and I doubt it it was counted as a crime
- a few months later I was almost drove over by a car in South London (the tyres went over my shoes). I went to the police station to report it, with the car registration number and all written details, but they refused to register it. "Sorry sir, it happens here all the time"
- once I saw a "drug party" late in the night on the communal parking. I started calling the police - no one answered the phone for 10 minutes. I gave up.
Statistics or lies?
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"Even in the fairly green and suburban area where we have lived for 30 years my 62 year old wife does not feel able to go out for an evening stroll. She tried it last week and was frequently accosted by men in cars."
And this is why no one can believe the Crime figures
These men have commited a crime (solicitation and/or assault) yet as the police were not informed, the 'recorded crime' numbers do not show this
Car vandalism, pickpocketing, mobile 'phone theft are all crimes, yet do not get recorded, so do not show on the figures
The rate of non-recorded crime has shot up in most peoples' perception, but of course that's not what the governemnt want to hear
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Much of our perception of crime suffers from the "good old days," allowing our selves to be wrapped up in the media's version of events which is more convenient to their profit margins that is to any possible historical accuracy.
Knife crime is possibly the perfect example of this. Violence including the use of a knife and the related gang violence are currently treated as a new phenomenon; gangs are seen as something belonging to largly immigrant culture and knives as the result of a break down in the institution of the family in recent years.
But, statiustics and history simply do not bear this out.
And this is not some knowledge only available to academics; if most people over a certain age looked back into what they heard and read about when they were young, they would see the truth of this.
I used to work in a youth club in the late 70s. We used to confiscate knives every single day - many from children as young as 11.
My brother remembers the mods and rockers (and earlier the Teddy Boys) of his era. Knives were the weapon of choice, and were carried as a badge of merit.
My father talked of the Knife Gangs in the east end of London and even in the 7 dials in the 1920s and 30s. Again, young children were often part of these violent and prolific gangs
Nothing is new
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The reality is that we don't know if it's true or not.
We have government figures, which have been massaged in the past for all sorts of purposes. For example reducing unemployment by redefining what unemployment is and ditto with measuring inflation.
Against that our only common empirical experience of crime is through the media, which filters and amplifies or diminishes it according to its own bandwagon agenda.
The media likes to play it up, the government likes to play it down, hence we don't know.
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Gurubear
I too have had quite a bit of experience, and I could recount the whole story of the arranged fist fight that I saw from a distance between one of my pupils and a boy from another Brixton street posse 20 years ago. The action was quickly over and my pupil was allowed safe passage out of the ring made by the other gang, having beaten the other youth unconscious. Mind you he started walking away and gradually quickened into a lope. Anything less might have been construed as swaggering insolence by the other posse.
Of course boys were often "tooled up". And school trips to France from the late sixties onwards were ideal chances to buy flick knives that were readily available across the Channel- just ask the customs office.
I recall one day in the late seventies a pupil was really upset because a youth from outside school had threatened him with a knife and he did not have one on him that day. The next day the youth who had threatened him came back to apologise. He had come to "sort out" someone who was bullying his little brother or cousin. It ended all smiles and mutual comprehension- and I pointed out "What would have happened had you been tooled up yesterday?"
The fact was, however, that at least the threat was related to something real a real problem; and the youth threatening was intending to persuade the bully to stop "or else". This is rather different from pulling out a knife and using it for no real reason at all on someone who has done no more than look at you to your mind disrespectfully.
But I would agree that our concern over recent knife crime may be disproportionate to the actual statistics. It really crystallises I think a general concern for the young people we see loafing around listlessly with no real ambitions or goals in a life that has so little value that it seems disposable. Perhaps the survey that suggests that as many as 20% of young people are doing nothing constructive with their lives is more significant.
Cass
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Whilst I can see the logic in Mark Easton's article, I believe crime statistics put out by this government resemble inflation figures in that they are totally counter-intuitive. In the same way that I can see my fuel bills rising by 60%, road fund by 33%, bread by 20% when the government says inflation is 2-3%, so I see evidence of (possibly unrecorded) crime rising when government figures tell us crime is actually falling.
I believe this is a side-effect of 11 years of Nu-Lab government, when we have come to take any statistics they issue with a whole mine of salt. As another correspondent put it, crime down 50%, tractor production up 120%! The parallels with the Stalinist Soviet Union are there...
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There are loads of problems with the British Crime Survey, beyond the fact that it doesn't record crimes against children or businesses. For example - it relies on people's memories; it doesn't use a representative sample of the population (same problems as the Census - people hide or won't answer the questions.) Also it uses an arbitrary cap of five offences. Since crime has - even on the BCS figures - risen a lot since the BCS started in 1981, this cap will screen out many more offences than it used to. Mark Easton's remarks about the need for a giant conspiracy to fiddle the figures reminds me of Lord Denning who applied a similar logic to dismiss an appeal - it was unthinkable that the police would lie. In reality though it is not necessary for there to be a giant conspiracy involving individual statisticians and policemen - just like when the government dodges a bullet by setting up a commission or an enquiry, once the terms of reference have been set by the politicians, the system inevitably finds what the politicians have set up the system to find.
However, though no one can know for sure, I do believe that crime has fallen a bit since the mid 1990s, or at least the long term rising trend has flattened out. While criminologists may be stumped for an answer, and pundits like Mark may be puzzled at the "contradiction" between falling crime and higher prison populations, normal people can work out that the more criminals you put in prison, the fewer crimes they can commit. We have Michael Howard to thank for this. And so, with this year's spate of even earlier releases caused by the government's woeful failure to build enough prisons, we can expect to see an uptick in crime over the next few years.
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I wish people would READ before stating things like "this is based on reported crime". Its NOT. As some other posters have pointed out itsbased on both reported crime AND interviews with thousands of people about both reported and unreported crime. I am an economist and statistician and use survey data on a daily basis - and am involved in checking figures on poverty and living standards - and can say I'm just sick and tired of people saying how these figures are "made up", "politically massaged" etc. Its offensive to the hundreds of civil servants and independent researchers who spend their working lives putting together the statistics that the media and politicians then misuse.
This blog was really well written and demonstrates very clearly that people are wrong. The key bit is the local/national picture differences. If people think crime is stable/falling locally but "rocketing nationally" how can both be happening? Because the thousands of local views add up to the country as a whole and surely we trust people to know their local area more than the national picture.
Some people need to take a reality check and stop getting so hot headed. A bit of cynicism is important and you need to be careful to check that figures aren't being spun. But by and large that actual statistics in this country are accurate and calculated by professionals not scoundrels. In the survey I use, ministers get access to the data shortly before the publication and after its all been signed off. And we independently check it and can report any discrepancies. Spin occurs not at the level of the statistics but in their presentation: only using selective numbers or comparing apples with pears. And here its the media focussing constantly on the parts of crime that are rising (e.g. drug use and stabbings this time) rather than those that are falling (almost all other crimes).
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seanlovell + anyone else with a similar story.
You MUST always report crime - even if the police do nothing about it.
Otherwise the Government will pat themselves on the back and say what a good job they have done.
By not reporting crime you may as well go and commit it - because you're assisting the criminals.
The Government won't increase the police unless they can clearly see a rise in crime.
This is why petty crime (like vandalism) is growing completely unchecked.
Even when a petty criminal stole my bike seat - I reported it. It took me 20 mins to fill out the form and a 40 minute wait in the police station (which I could not afford to waste) - but the importance is to get it down on paper. I couldn't claim on the insurance, but if my only recourse is to assist the police in getting more funding by increasing the figures - then that is what I must do.
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The Freakonomics abortion argument is interesting, but equally so is the evidence for a link between falling lead pollution (particularly relating to phasing out of leaded fuels) and falling levels of violent crimes. Hardly surprising when you consider the link between lead and impulsivity problems in children.
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