7 hours 20 mins ago Shadow home secretary Chris Grayling said his party had conducted research which showed offences against a person had risen from 618,417 in 1998 to 887,942 last year. "This new analysis confirms that the level of violent crime actually reported to police officers in police stations up and down the country is much higher than it was a decade ago," he said. "This just serves to underline the scale of the challenge the country faces in fixing our broken society." The Conservatives said they commissioned analysis from the House of Commons library but have not published the data. Last month the statistics watchdog warned Mr Grayling he risked "damaging trust" in statistics by claiming there had been a sharp rise in crime. The chairman of the UK Statistics Authority said it was misleading to compare data collected before 2002 with information collected after, because of a change in the way offences were recorded. Police officers used to decide if an offence should be classified as an act of violence but the rule change handed that power to victims instead. The Government insists a different measure, the British Crime Survey, is more accurate. It found a 41% drop in violent crime since 1997. "Throughout the country the chance of being a victim of any crime is at its lowest level since 1981 and recent figures show that homicide is at its lowest level for a decade," a spokesman for theHome Office said. "However, we recognise that we can never be complacent. That is why we have invested heavily in tackling violent crime of all kinds through responsive policing, tough powers, and funding for prevention projects."Tories: Violent Crime Up 44% Under Labour
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Tuesday, 9 March 2010
Violent crime has risen by 44% under Labour despite Government assurances that the number of offences has fallen, the Conservatives have claimed.
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