The Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill represents a real opportunity to change the way we collate crime statistics.
At present, there is huge bureaucratic and political pressure to say: “Crime is coming down.” Of course this is natural. Everyone wants to believe that things are getting better. The problem with this, is that it translates into an immense personal pressure on individual police officers, not to record crime.
We literally have a system that encourages them to sit at their desks. Because police go out on the streets, and find criminals, their statistics look worse and worse.
One solution - as proposed by the Chief Constable of Essex (Mr Barker-McCardle) - is to record two kinds of statistics:
Similar to the Australian system, a distinction is made between crimes that have been reported by the public, and crimes that have been discovered by the Police.
The idea is that instead of one single box for recording crime, where everything gets jumbled and mixed in together, there are two boxes instead:
- In the first box, we would measure crime reported by the public. Police Officers and PCSOs would be encouraged to reduce these crimes.
- In the second box, we would measure crime proactively discovered by the Police. If the number of these crimes increased, we would not worry unduly. Because it would mean that the Police are doing their job --- going out, and patrolling the streets, and uncovering the hidden thugs and criminals who are disrupting our neighbourhoods.
As we look at reform, we should consider how to free our Police Officers from the immense political pressure to always say that crime statistics are coming down.
I welcome openess in public information, such as Crime Mapping, which the Government is pushing for - but I hope also that the Home Office will consider the Australian system of recording crime.
by Robert Halfon - www.roberthalfon.blogspot.com
