A round-up of crime reduction news of interest to security and CCTV readers.
Despite the Government putting the best gloss on its crime fighting, a new Home Office Targets Delivery Report (Cm 5754) admits failings. One target is to ‘increase the number and proportion of recorded crimes for which an offender is brought to justice’. However whereas 1,104,000
offences were brought to justice in 1999-2000, that total fell to 1,024,654 in 2001-2, the report says. In a foreword, Home Secretary David Blunkett hails a a 27 per cent fall in crime since 1997, according to the latest British Crime Survey; and a 37pc increase in the number of organised criminal groups disrupted by the police. The document lists targets for policing, prisons and the criminal justice system. Some targets are however vague – ‘reduce drug related crime’, for example. Others – ‘reduce by 2004 the economic cost of crime’ – are dubious because of the question of how crime costs are measured. The Home Office is using the British Crime Survey which looks at households and does not take in businesses. The same difficulty of measuring applies to reducing fear of crime and raising public confidence in the system. The report costs £8.90 but is downloadable free from site. <a href="www.homeoffice.gov.uk" targey="_blank">www.homeoffice.gov.uk</a>
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Lost law
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The forces of law and order have lost control of UK streets, according to think-tank Civitas.
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In the face of staggering volumes of crime, ssays the Civitas report, the police and the Home Office are reduced to ‘bringing crime under control’ by legalising or decriminalising many offences on the grounds that they aren’t so bad after all. The police have been overwhelmed by the sheer volume of crime. In 1931 there were three crimes a year for every police officer. In 2001 there were 44. effectiveness of the police force in reducing crime depends to a great extent to the way in which police officers are deployed
But the police response made matters even worse. They neglected crimes which they chose to define as ‘minor’, including drug taking and the intimidation of ordinary people by drunken youths; but, as New York’s police discovered, localities in which ‘minor’ offences abound quickly become safe havens for serious criminals.
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In The Failure of Britain’s Police, Norman Dennis, George Erdos and David Robinson write of a ‘fundamental shift within two or three generations, and especially the shift that began about 1955, in the law-abidingness and "policeability" of the English’ (p.10). The statistics which demonstrate this fundamental shift are easy enough to obtain from official sources: ‘the difficulty is… for them to be believed’, so incredibly small do the criminal statistics of earlier generations appear to us (p.9).
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The almost inconceivable rise in crime in England
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The Home Office claims that the chance of being a crime victim ‘remains historically low'(p.10), in spite of the fact that in 1972 there were a total of 1.7 million crimes, and in 2002 there were 5.8 million. In 1972 there were 8,900 robberies in the whole of England and Wales. In 2001/2 there were 6,500 in the London Borough of Lambeth alone. In the one month of December 2002, there were 282 robberies of personal property in Lambeth. This exceeds the figure for all robberies, personal and business, for the whole of England and Wales in the whole of any year between the two world wars, with the exception of 1932, when there were 342, and 1938, when there were 287.
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There has been a six per cent improvement on last year’s February figure for street crime in London. But just how meagre the achievement is can be seen from the fact that muggings are still up by 11 per cent compared with February 2001. On the time-scale of the present government’s tenure of office: in 1997 there were 27,000 robberies in London, in 2002 there were 45,000 – a 63 per cent increase. On the time-scale of the past twenty years or so, the total number of robberies in London in January and February of this year, 7,300, is not much less than the figure for the of the whole year of 1980 – 7,600.
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Police numbers and police effectiveness
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In The Failure of Britain’s Police, Norman Dennis, George Erdos and David Robinson examine the extent to which methods of policing can affect crime levels. They reveal that, in spite of increases in numbers of police, the volume of crime has increased faster than the size of the police force. Measured by reported crimes in relation to each police officer, the police force would need to be two and a half times larger than it is to maintain the ratio which we had in 1971.
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Official fall
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Overall crime in England and Wales fell 9 per cent in the 12 months to December 2002, according to the British Crime Survey. Police recorded crime, after adjustment for recording changes, is also down seven per cent. Publishing the second quarterly crime update for Crime in England and Wales Home Office Minister Bob Ainsworth said: ‘These figures show Government measures to reduce crime are working. Crime is continuing a downward trend and the risk of being a victim remains at its lowest level for 20 years.’ For the 12 months to December 2002 (compared with the 2001 BCS) shows: 26.4 per cent had been a victim of crime ‘ around the same as the first BCS results in 1981; an 11 per cent fall in domestic burglary;
two per cent fall in violent crime; and 17 per cent fall in vehicle theft.
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Recorded crime October to December 2002 (compared with the same quarter the previous year shows): 4.1 per cent increase in total recorded crime (seven per cent fall after adjustment for recording changes); 21.2 per cent fall in robbery (23 per cent fall after adjustment for recording changes); three per cent fall in vehicle crime (6 six per cent fall after adjustment for recording changes); and 0.9 per cent increase in criminal damage (8 per cent fall after adjustment for recording changes).
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What they add
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Bob Ainsworth added: ‘Falls in burglary, violent crime, robbery and vehicle theft means fewer victims, but we are not complacent. We have a record number of police officers’ 131,548. We have matched our promises with money and substantially increased police funding, which is rising by 6.2 per cent in 2003/4 alone. And we are reforming the way they work which means they will be able to spend more time fighting crime, rather than on paperwork. These extra police officers are helping to tackle all types of crime providing reassurance to communities. We are also investing in Community Support Officers who will provide a visible deterrent to those engaging in such behaviour. There are now 1,281 CSOs in training or on the streets. The Government remains focused on fighting crime. We are improving the criminal justice system to make it more efficient and we are ensuring more support is given to victims and witness so we can reduce crime and the fear of crime.?
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Anti-social concern
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The number of people who are concerned about teenagers hanging around on the streets has increased. Mr Ainsworth said: ‘Anti-social behaviour can have a terrible effect on people and ruin communities. Tackling this is a Government priority which is why we introduced a Bill with a raft of measures to combat unruly children, noisy neighbours, graffiti and crack houses. We all have a part to play in tackling this problem. Working together we can make a real difference in turning around some of our most disadvantaged neighbourhoods, giving people a better quality of life."
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About the National Crime Recording Standard
NCRS was introduced formally in all police forces in April 2002 and informally in a number of forces prior to this. In July it was announced this would have an estimated effect of increasing recorded crime by 15 to 20 per cent. Most of the recorded crime figures have therefore been adjusted to take account of this.
