22
Jan
2015
By Calvin at 16:57 GMT, 9 years ago
The Office for National Statistics has today published Crime in England and Wales, Year Ending September 2014
Here are their headlines:
- Latest figures from the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) show that, for the offences it covers, there were an estimated 7.0 million incidents of crime against households and resident adults (aged 16 and over) in England and Wales. This represents an 11% decrease compared with the previous year’s survey, and is the lowest estimate since the CSEW began in 1981.
- The CSEW covers a broad range of victim based crimes and includes crimes which do not come to the attention of the police. Decreases were evident for almost all crime types compared with the previous year; including vehicle-related theft and criminal damage (both falling by 15%) and other household theft (down 9%).
- In contrast, police recorded crime shows no overall change from the previous year, with 3.7 million offences recorded in the year ending September 2014.
- The renewed focus on the quality of crime recording is likely to have prompted improved compliance with national standards, leading to more crimes being recorded than previously. This is thought to have particularly affected the police recorded figures for violence against the person (up 16%), public order offences (up 10%) and sexual offences (up 22%).
- The numbers of rapes (24,043) and other sexual offences (48,934) are the highest recorded by the police since 2002/03. As well as improvements in recording, this is thought to reflect a greater willingness of victims to come forward to report such crimes.
- There was an increase in the volume of fraud recorded (5% year on year), though it is difficult to judge to what extent this was affected by the transfer in responsibility of recording fraud offences from individual police forces to Action Fraud, or reflected an increase in public reports or a rise in actual criminality. It is thought that levels of fraud are substantially under-reported and thus these figures simply provide a measure of such offences brought to the attention of the authorities.
In addition to the above here are some other findings from the survey:
- Offences involving firearms are down 7% on last year and down 42% since the year 2008 – 2009 (police data).
- The CSEW estimates 789,000 burglaries for the year up to September 2014 and is little changed from the previous year as the apparent 8% decrease is not statistically significant. Domestic burglary follows a similar pattern to that seen for overall crime and despite some fluctuations the trend has remained fairly flat between 2004/05 and 2010/11. Estimates for the year ending September 2014 are 40% lower than those in 2003/04 and 67% lower than those in the 1995 survey.
- The apparent 9% decrease in theft from the person based on interviews in the year ending September 2014 compared with the previous year was not statistically significant. Estimates of the volume of theft from the person offences are low and subject to fluctuations from year to year in the survey. The CSEW shows an unusually high estimate measured by the 2008/09 survey when there was a significant increase, followed by a significant decrease in 2009/10. Other than this, CSEW estimates of theft from the person have remained fairly flat.
- There was no change in the level of bicycle theft with the apparent 1% increase not being statistically significant. The year ending September 2014 CSEW indicates that around 3% of bicycle owning households were victims of bicycle theft in the previous 12 months, down from 6% in the 1995 survey
- There were around 1.4 million incidents of criminal damage of personal and household property; a decrease of 15% from the previous year. This is the lowest count since the survey began.
The full report, Crime in England and Wales, Year Ending September 2014, can be read here: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171778_392380.pdf
