Crime Comparisons, 2007-08

Statistics on crime recorded by the police, on crime and perceptions from the British Crime Survey and on crime and criminal justice from Eurostat include data for Wales and Welsh police force areas, England and English Government Office Regions and other countries for the financial year 2007-08.

International comparisons (Not in the scope of National Statistics)
The charts showing international comparisons have been removed from this bulletin following a review of guidance issued by Eurostat. The guidance highlighted the substantial differences in the way crimes are recorded in different countries and advised that comparisons are only made in terms of trends over time and not in crime levels. A statistical article on international comparisons, following the Eurostat guidance, will be published in September 2009.

The key points from the bulletin are

Police recorded crime

• Wales had a lower rate of total crime than England (lower than 7 of the 9 Government Office Regions in 2007-08).

British Crime Survey

• Wales had lower rates than England for both household and personal crime in 2007-08, ranking third lowest for household crime and second lowest for personal crime when compared with the Government Office Regions in England.
• Wales had fairly low proportions of respondents with high levels of worry about crime, but a higher proportion of respondents perceiving high levels of anti-social behaviour.
• Respondents in Wales had low levels of confidence in the criminal justice system, ranking lowest for confidence in local police and second lowest for confidence in the criminal justice system as a whole.

Further information can be found at the StatsWales website.

Contact

Tel: 029 2082 5061
E-mail: stats.inclusion@wales.gsi.gov.uk

Next update

June 2010 (provisional - to be confirmed on the Due Out Soon page)