I caught the PM news headlines this evening on BBC Radio 4 and they were feverishly retailing the notion that crime is at an all-time low in England and Wales. There was a consistent stream of government friendly sound-bites from the PM gang suggesting that it is only our “perceptions” about crime that we now have to fear. The BBC breathlessly relates that Home Secretary Jacqui Smith is “extremely pleased” at this welcome “news”. I wonder if she is related to the Jacqui Smith who announced that she would not feel safe walking the streets of London after dark? Perhaps crime has tumbled since she said that back in January?
RELAX – CRIME IS GOING DOWN.
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They had some tosspot professor of criminology from Scumbag University on Radio 2 at lunchtime bleating that crime was down quoting the British Crime Survey as the gospel.
Everyone knows its a scam and all the callers to the program pointed this out.
When will Nulab and their Al BBC shills realise we can see the reality with our own eyes every day?
Yup
All BBC TV & radio channels plus C4 all singing from the same nulab songsheet tonight:-
“Crime has been coming down since 1995” – “….”only our perception of crime is inreasing” – and, most bizarrely – “….tabloid newspaper readers are particularly susceptible to the belief that crime is increasing.”
The ignorant, unwashed swine!
Or maybe they’re the ones who get stabbed whenever they venture past their front door.
Probably not so much of a problem in Hampstead.
Your BBC – bringing the Dear Leader’s message to you
Jeez, it’s not rocket science. Its REPORTED crime that’s at an all time low.
When we had a particularly nasty ourbreak of poachers on the farm in the Spring, all plod wanted to know was would we be reporting it? This was after he’d pointed out that they knew who it was, and that these boys were from the travelling community (Read between the lines: “We can’t touch ’em!”).
Huge relief in his eyes when we agreed not to report it.
Chuffer: Well-pointed out. With the BBC’s coverage, it’s easy to miss (probably intentionally) that the figures refer only to reported crime. The reality is that crime has not gone down, rather the general public’s faith in our politicised constabularies’ abilities has instead. Thus the public have ceased to report crimes that in the past would have been, knowing full well that they will get little response. I suspect more accurately actual crime has gone up along with bureaucracy leading to overworked police, and consequently a decrease in public trust. Certainly from my own experience earlier this year after I was pickpocketed, I wouldn’t bother to report much.
“Probably not so much of a problem in Hampstead.”
Even the Beeboids on the Heath?
Your BBC – bringing the Dear Leader’s message to you
John Reith spins in his grave | Homepage | 17.07.08 – 8:05 pm | #
And what the makes a clip from a shitty BBC TV programme FRONT page news?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
Who else Gordon the Moron. Front page news my arse.
meggoman:
Your BBC – bringing the Dear Leader’s message to you
John Reith spins in his grave | Homepage | 17.07.08 – 8:05 pm | #
And what the makes a clip from a shitty BBC TV programme FRONT page news?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
Who else Gordon the Moron. Front page news my arse.
meggoman | 17.07.08 – 9:06 pm | #
Oops forgot this
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7512734.stm
Oh, what a blessed relief. The daily news of another teen stabbed to death and images of a minister walking around her constituency dressed in kevlar accompanied by two cops had me slightly worried.
As I mentioned previously, wanker like Mark Easton try to spin this crap s all positive for Nu Labour. I was really annoyed when the little skinny BBC troll said “It’s my opinion that crime is falling” like we give a shit what a little prick like him thinks.
Oh and I notice that according to the figures sexual crime is down. So how come only the other week we were being told that rape is under reported and only something like 5% of rape cases ends in a conviction? Shouldn’t that be going UP if women are being encouraged to report it more?
So are Nu Labour responsible for making cars harer to steal?
Are they making it harder to flog a car stereo on the black market?
Most people have lost faith in the Police and have simply beefed up their own home security so that the scum now go for the easy targets, like the elderly and vulnerable.
The Police often fiddle the figures to show improvements where none exist.
As I mentioned before, if the Police are doing such a good job, cut their resources back. Less crime means they need fewer officers and fewer Police cars.
Now lets see them fiddle the crime figures.
Anyone who doesn’t think Mark Easton is up the bum of Nu Labour should read his latest blog entry.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2008/07/crime_lies_and_statistics.html
well we know what the government thinks…
a top guy at the fabian society, which has been the heart of labour for 100 years, has said feral youths DONT EXIST IN REALITY ands has been MADE UP by the nasty milk stealing tory toffs at the Daily Mail.
Lest we brush this off the left REALLY BELIEVES THIS.
Right to the very top of their intellectual food chain.
can TPO from the other thread explain how the crime stats are fixed…
i want to add it to my enormous list
this governments 9% crime reduction in one year is a phenomenal achievement.
why thats now a 50% reduction since 1995
and with these experts in charge there will be no crime to speak of in ten years at 10% reduction a year.
however as Hugh has just said “the problem is Mark people just dont believe these figures”
adam | Homepage | 17.07.08 – 9:39 pm
Adam – this is how it is fixed.
“The annual crime report for 2007-2008 reveals the longest recorded period of falling crime – down 48% from 1995.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7511192.stm
Now how can they take 1995 as the base?
In 1998/99 the figures were counted for a finacial year ie April to March whereas the year before it was from Jan – Dec. Second in 2002 the NCRS (National Crime Recording Standards) was introduced which basically changed the way that crime were recorded. And there has been further tinkering at the edges ever since.
Note that The NCRS meant that every crime had to be recorded which would have increased the crime figures – so if in that year more crimes were recorded the percentages would have gone up.
This was always highligted in official reports so no one really knew if it was a genuine increase or if it was just down to the new recording.
Therefore any changes since then are impossible to compare with the previous years and certainly could not be compared to 1995.
I also doubt that, because the way crime is recorded differs almost every year, you could compare these figures with last year.
So you see that percentages mean nothing What you need is the actual numbers, and not nationally but locally.
So the fatal stabbing tonight in SW London is probably a figment of my imagination?
This is great news.
So we can look forward to no ID cards. No extra authoritarian confusing and highly selectively implemented new laws, NOT.
However whether reported crime is down or not means in reality so close to nothing it does indeed mean less then nothing.
The reality is this.
The police are no longer employed to protect life, liberty and property, if indeed they ever were.
However we are paying an ever increasing amount for our police and judicial, so called services.
Has anyone reading this tried reporting any type of serious crime anytime over the last 20 or so years. I have and it is NO JOKE.
It is not only not funny it is more then enough to stop you ever bothering again, especially if your life has been threatened.
ALL you will receive at best is a sympathetic police officer telling you how BRAVE you are. Also how they can ‘under certain circumstances’ and ‘only during working hours’ protect your wife and children should you ‘VERY BRAVELY’ take it to court.
Banksters run our government and their brother Gangsters run our streets. It has been so long before the Cray Twins and will carry on being so a long time after my grandchildren start pushing up the daisies.
Without SERIOUS crime especially we would not need hardly any policemen, lawyers, insurance companies, probation officers, social workers, prison officers, Judges, prisons, or late Friday night A&E services.
The state simply could not handle the loss of status, income, and power. We might even start to wonder if we need an establishment or its state at all.
“That simply will not do, will not do at all.”
As far as the state is concerned, a few dead people every week and millions living in marginalized fear, is a tiny if not completely insignificant price, for them NOT to be paying a single penny for.
So what is the solution, apart from complete deregulation of the broadcast /mind control industry, starting with the death of the BBC?
There is no other solution worth note, as things are.
Unless the people of this rapidly dieing democracy know the REAL unadulterated truth, NOTHING can or will change for the better.
If such an unlikely thing did happen solutions that would work could be formulated which would have an immediate and long term positive effect.
I can not recall the precise statistics, but something like 95% of all serious crime in London is carried out by no more then 2000 well known to the police, many times convicted habitual criminals.
All we have to do is take these chaps permanently out of circulation. This can be easily, humanly and very cheaply done.
Of course setting up a secure, 3 times and you are out lifers colony in Botany Bay is no longer an option, the Aussies would have a fit. But I am sure a small almost uninhabited Island off the Scottish coast could be found and utilized for this purpose.
It will not of course happen for the reasons I have already stated.
The only other problem I have with this otherwise PERFECT SOLUTION is that without a deregulated and free broadcast media. I would not trust the state to start the colony by sending people like myself there first. Followed by most of you lot.
The police may well under-report crimes, or the public may opt not to report them. But no one on this thread has yet addressed why the British Crime Survey, which measures individuals’ experience of crime, shows a similar fall. Unless you do, I think you’ve lost this particular argument.
Look,can’t you B-BBC crowd get this into your heads? Overall, crime is down,it is just that fatal stabbings are on the increase.
Yaffle | 17.07.08 – 10:29 pm |
You really should not believe any statistics that are handed out by governments or the BBC.
“The report, ‘Crime in England and Wales: More Violence and More Chronic Victims’, is written by Graham Farrell, professor of criminology at Loughborough University, and Ken Pease, visiting professor at Loughborough and former acting head of the Police Research Group at the Home Office.
It reveals that, ever since its inception in 1981, the British Crime Survey (BCS) has omitted many crimes committed against people who have been repeat victims. If people are victimised in the same way by the same perpetrators more than five times in a year, the number of crimes is recorded as five. The justification for this was ‘to avoid extreme cases distorting the rates’. But as Farrell and Pease point out, if the people who say they suffered ten incidents really did, capping the series at five distorts the rate.
By recalculating the figures without the arbitrary ‘If (number greater than 5) = 5’ rule, Farrell and Pease have revealed that there are over three million crimes omitted from the BCS as it is now published.”
http://www.lboro.ac.uk/service/publicity/news-releases/2007/89_crime.html
“But no one on this thread has yet addressed why the British Crime Survey, which measures individuals’ experience of crime, shows a similar fall”
Every victim of crime,how pray? This is just the same kind of figures we get on inflation.Criminal damage probably gets under reported,simply because no one is charged.
I would bet that a significant A&E cases do not get reported as crimes because people keep their mouths shut.
Jon,
Yes, that might result in the BCS showing an under-reported figure, and clearly it has other shortcomings which Mark Easton alludes to. But you haven’t explained why it should still show a fall, when the methodology hasn’t changed recently.
Y
Yaffle: TheBritish crime survey? Have YOU ever been asked to give your opinion? I haven’t (victim of car being broken into twice, vandalised once and theft of bike from rear garden)
Even someone as trusting of Nu Labour as you are should know that it’s what you ask, not what people tell you.
The crime figures are fiddled just like exam results are. If kids keep getting “smarter” under Nu Labour in a few years everyone taking an exam will pass and no one will fail.
So if the kids are getting so much smarter why are Universities having to run remedial courses in subjects like Maths?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/main.jhtml?xml=/education/2005/09/07/edcolumn07.xml
All Governments spin statistics, even Tory ones. The issue I have is when the BBC spouts Nu Labour stats as facts.
Remember the lies over immigration?
Martin and others,
I’m sorry to hear that you have been victims of crime. But not having been asked by BCS doesn’t prove anything. I’ve never been asked either. But then I’ve never been asked to perform jury duty. Does that mean I think there is some conspiracy to keep me out of the judicial system? No.
Unless you can come up with some evidence that British Market Research Bureau Limited, which conducts the BCS, is systematically under-reporting people’s experience of crime, I’m afraid you’re whistling in the wind on this one.
For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t vote Labour, Nu- or otherwise, if they were the last party on Earth, and I hold no brief for the BBC. But I think its manifest shortcomings should be addressed by cogent, well-supported arguments, not scattergun moans.
Y
I’m sorry, Yaffle, I am sitting in front of my screen open-mouthed in incredulity that someone can regard the BMRB so highly.
As a participant in the YouGov programme, I can play ‘spot the loaded question’ with the best of them.
Like the other commenters here, I have no faith whatsoever in the Government’s crime figures. and even less in the BBC’s willingness to explore them critically.
No doubt, the ‘Right wing hate-mongers’ in the Press will get down to that in a day or two. We’ll see how justified your faith is then.
I have to confess I have no personal evidence as to whether crime has gone up or down.
However as I mentioned recently on another thread, the clear BBC agenda on climate change makes me distrust everything they tell me and there’s something about the coverage which gets my antennae twitching.
The 10 o’clock news was all on the lines of “crime has gone down, why can’t people accept that to be the case”. They should also have been asking “given that people don’t think crime has gone down, how might the statistics be wrong?”. They didn’t. The coverage was all from one angle. Like the climate change coverage.
Yaffle
The BCS does not cover all crimes, only those classed as household crimes (e.g. burglary, thefts of and from vehicles, vandalism and theft from the home), and personal crimes (e.g. assaults, robberies, thefts from the person and other personal thefts). The BCS does not cover crimes against organisations (e.g. fraud, shoplifting), “victimless” crimes e.g. drug abuse or murder, manslaughter. It also does not record crimes perpertrated by or against children.
So the so called feral youths of today are not covered in the BCS nor are the most serious crimes – there is a lot left out.
Jon,
Indeed – but “burglary, thefts of and from vehicles, vandalism and theft from the home, assaults, robberies, thefts from the person and other personal thefts” does cover a large chunk of the crime spectrum – certainly the sorts of crimes people worry about.
My point still stands that criticisms of BCS/BMRB have yet to show how they could have engineered a steady 10-year decline in reported figures. I for one would be quite prepared to believe that crime in these categories has indeed been going up and there’s some fiendish conspiracy to try to make me think otherwise. But so far no one has convinced me that there is.
Y
I know of several people in London who have been mugged or assaulted and know that is a complete waste of time expecting plod to do anything about it. The only time the boys-in-blue are quick to act is when a member of the public has a go at some teenage thug and guess who gets arrested. The police in this country are an overpaid joke – their high command are more interested in stopping “islamophobia” or hassling the BNP , while the average plod on the beat seem to resent us for even reporting crimes. From a civilised society to a zoo in four decades !! God help us.
the bcs shows knife incidents about 130k a year. Government figures show 22k and im not sure if thats using hospital estimates.
Jon, thanks for your information.
My experience of Labour spin is that what you have listed will only the tip of the iceberg. Lets not forget what they did with waiting lists.
What about definition of ‘crime,’ changing definitions is a favourite technique. Perhaps some is now under an ‘anti-social behaviour’
category
…shortcomings should be addressed by cogent, well-supported arguments, not scattergun moans.
Y
Yaffle | 17.07.08 – 10:57 pm | #
IMHO opinion surveys should never be used to evaluate or determine public policy.
However sophisticated the method – they all suffer from a fatal flaw.
The contributors end up being a self selecting minority of the population.
Many people (including me) refuse on principle to participate in any kind of survey, whoever asks.
The people who usually agree are likely to include a disproportionate number of those who support the aims of the survey or the surveying organisation – and are therefore more likely to give supportive responses.
Opinion surveys are fine for marketing – because the people who want to participate are likely to also be the target consumers for the product, and the others are probably not going to buy it anyway.
Whe used in the public arena, such distortions make them completely undemocratic.
The question that should be asked is “Why has the incidence of crime gone down so dramatically”?
The police have disappeared from the streets,it is all but impossible to call the police out.
Drug usage hasn’t decreased,the consumption of alcohol has increased,prisons are debauching criminals onto the streets early and immigration is out of control,the Home Office has lost track of foreign criminals.
Something, somewhere stinks.
So the fatal stabbing tonight in SW London is probably a figment of my imagination?
No in spite of the fact that this was reported by the BBC it most likely is not a figment of your imagination.
However please try to think instead of simply reacting like a brainwashed monkey.
How many dangerous dogs have there been lately trying to eat people since the dangerous dogs act?
Do you think this is because all of the owners of dangerous dogs are currently obeying the law?
Or do you believe that since our controlled media pulled a fast one on us just to see quite how stupid we really are. All the dangerous dogs in the country have suddenly become responsible citizens only interested in pedigree chum?
Idiots and criminal have been stabbing each other since we started making flint tools, ie since the stone age.
Dangerous dogs have been dangerous since a long time before that.
However these things only become political issues designed SOLELY to bring in authoritarian bullshit rules and regulations when the media are collectively INSTRUCTED to report on them.
As I have stated above. Crime is crime and we all know what crime is, including most children over 5 years old.
If you deliberately stab anyone for any reason other then self defence you are a criminal c..t, not worthy of redemption or sympathy of any kind IMO. Even if some people believe some are worthy of such things, these people should still be permanently removed from normal society and not in anyway allowed to breed, retain wealth or property or be involved with ANY children. FOREVER.
This can be done, but is not even being contemplated by the powers that be. ASK yourself WHY?
Knives are an essential object, for survival, education, production, cooking, and hunting among other things. As a honest conscience and common law abiding citizen I resent absolutely being told what I can and can not have in my pocket, for what ever reason I wish to have it there.
Not wanting to depress anyone by this next statement, I know I will do so anyway.
The real reason why the media is being instructed to concentrate on this issue, is this.
The establishment KNOW that for the foreseeable future we the British people are not going to be very happy at all. In fact they know for sure we are going to be very ANGRY and in many cases very angry and hungry as well. Especially when we finally work out why we are hungry and who is to blame.
They have taken away our hand guns and now they want to make even carrying a pen knife highly illegal.
Get it YET?
“the average plod on the beat seem to resent us for even reporting crimes” @11:23
‘d like to hear that from the average plod on the beat. I’d like to hear it from any plod on the beat. I’d just like to see a plod on the beat.
Fewer people watch state TV news with every passing day……
Jon
Yaffle has got a point. If the methodology has not changed then the “5” cut-off becomes a red herring; unless the there is an upward trend in repeat crimes by one person against another one.
@ John Reid spins in his grave
Are you really saying that all surveys are unreliable due to self-selection bias? Would this mean that the current Tory lead in the polls can not be believed?
@ adam
” … and with these experts in charge there will be no crime to speak of in ten years at 10% reduction a year.”
Not quite, a steady 10% decrease in crime per annum would not mean that crime is extinct after 10 years.
Assume you start with 100 cases. 10% reduction in the first year would leave you with 90 crimes, in year 2 with 81 crimes, in year 3 with 73 and so on.
http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2008/07/damned-lies-and-crime-statistics.html
Yaffle
I am happy that you are reasured by the latest Government Statistics. I wish I was.
But can’t you see that if the BCS misses out so many crimes and under reports others – that these crimes could be increasing – so that more crimes are not being caught in the survey. Burglary and car theft are probably going down (due to better security measures ) and nasty crimes they are but violent crime is not.
Are the media then over reporting knife crimes by children?
But the BBC piece was talking about “Recorded crime figures show fall ” – and as I have pointed out above they cannot compare these figures year on year let alone to a 1995 baseline.
gunnar, yep.
even 10% of each years figures would be a large drop. it could just as easily be the equivelent drop each year.
either way its an obvious nonsense. imo
If you want to compare figures try these
In 1998 there were 4,545,337 recorded crimes and according to the BBC “there were five million recorded crimes” in 2007/08- now if we could compare like with like crime has gone up. But of course this is nonsense.
in fact i remember the bbc reporting there had been a 25% drop in crime over a few months somewhere in Devon. I had to just laugh out loud, its such obvious propaganda.
Yaffle: Do you really believe that the standard of education is going up year on year as Government statistics show?
Yaffle: Suppose you take the Government stats as accurate. Why is crime falling?
Our prisons (we are told) are full to bursting even though we’re told they don’t work. So who is getting locked up (OK I know TV tax non payers and a few pensioners get banged up) but if crime is really falling should the prisons be empty?
The other issue is the Government takes credit but as I’ve pointed out many crimes that clearly ARE falling (like stealing from cars and taking cars themselves) are because of improved car security. Both of the cars I had broken into were company vehicles, neither of which had an alarm fitted (something the little shit would have known)
I’ve NEVER had a vehicle broekn into that has a car alarm even though I’ve lived in the same area for 13 years.
So that has nothing to do with the Police or fatty Spliff. It’s to do with car manufacturers being under pressure from insurance companies and people who buy cars to make then more difficult to steal.
But non the less the BBC don’t point that out.
Take sexual crime. How can that possibly be falling when we are continually being told by the very same BBC that crimes like rape (date rape) are on the increase? Perhaps they are not?
As for violent crime. Maybe it is falling because fewer and fewer people venture out on their own in the evenings or tend to drive or take a taxi?
Fact is I don’t know and the wankers at the BBC like Mark Easton are simply spouting crap because he doesn’t know either.
There is clearly a disconnect between what the Government/BBC say and the feelings of the public.
Perhaps there needs to be an examination of those figures how the questions are put and who they ask?
But no, the BBC simply spout Government spin as facts.
You just know if a Tory Government tried that, the BBC would be all over it.
Excluding those under sixteen will slew the figures.For example drug dealers use children to carry drugs and guns,some immigrant groups use children to steeal on the streets.
Spliff wont go out at night. Pathetic.
jackboot straw rushes through annon witness leg. becaure the good people of this country are so scared they wont go to court.
I had to turn off Radio 4 twice tonight because of their overly foreign content.
Its such a shame that the BBC has turned into the Bias Broad Casting Company.
It was a jewel, now its foreign owned and run as far as I can tell.
Martin,
To take your points in turn:
– Do you really believe that the standard of education is going up year on year as Government statistics show?
No I don’t, but then we know that for example the exams are getting progressively harder to fail. No one has suggested any such specious cause for the crime figures.
– if crime is really falling should the prisons be empty?
No. Because every persistent crim banged up inside is a crim not nicking your video.
– many crimes that clearly ARE falling (like stealing from cars and taking cars themselves) are because of improved car security. So that has nothing to do with the Police
Indeed – but the BBC reports have not AFIAK claimed that it *was* down to the Police. The same goes for house burglaries, and here as I recall they did suggest that this was because people have invested in more home security.
– Take sexual crime. How can that possibly be falling when we are continually being told by the very same BBC that crimes like rape (date rape) are on the increase? Perhaps they are not?
Indeed. I think this case shows up most strongly the limitations of basing conclusions on statistics. I doubt anyone has good uncontested stats on this one because it’s so politically loaded.
– As for violent crime. Maybe it is falling because fewer and fewer people venture out on their own in the evenings or tend to drive or take a taxi?
Again yes; also hard to quantify. But quite possibly here both sides are right – people are fearful of crime, possibly quite rightly, so they behave more cautiously. The crime figures drop as a result, but has society gained at all?
Rgds,
Y
I’m sure there must be a Consumer Prices Index/Retail Prices Index situation here. There’s the Govt favourite – the CPI, which keeps ‘inflation’ nice’n’low (or used to), and then there’s the one that is more realistsic.
The BCS is the CPI of crime figures.
The biggest fall in crime has come about by no-one wanting to steal mobile phones now, because we don’t have to.
In the mid to late nineties a massive amount of recorded crime was for mobile phone theft because insurance companies insisted on a crime number before they would pay out…even if it had just been lost!
Yaffle: Sorry but you’re not listening. The Government is saying that the ‘supposed’ fall in crime is down to them and their ‘policies’ of more Police and tougher sentances.
That’s bollocks.
1. In regards to exams you are quite right. We need to investigate WHY exam results are going up, but Universities are complaining that many students lack basic numeracy skills. Just like the supposed fall in crime needs to be investigated to find out why the figures appear to be falling but most people believe crime is rising.
2. Prisons. No if crime were falling the prisons would be empty, not full.
3. Sexual crime and violent crime. Sorry but you yourself make my point. The BBC have simply taken these figues and spouted them as FACTS. If the Tory party gave out a spending plan, do you think the BBC wouldn’t spend hours pulling it apart?
Many people do not trust the Police figures just as they don’t trust NHS figures and local Council figures.
The idea that the Police would’nt lie to make themselves look good is nonsense and there are many documented accounts of where the Police are ‘encouraged’ to manipulate figures.
AS some have said here, try contacting your local Police station to report a crime, you’re kept on hold and can often end up giving up (as I’ve done) waiting.
Subtle, but it works.