Crime in The United Kingdom - Extent of Crime

Extent of Crime

Police recorded crime figures for England & Wales 2011/12 were published on 19/07/12 and have been summarised here 2011/12 crime figures

In England and Wales, there were 880,000 "Violence against the person" crimes in 2008–9, equivalent to 16 per thousand people. There were about 50,000 sexual offences during the same period, just under 1 per thousand. Other areas of crime included robbery (80,000; equivalent to around 1.5 crimes/per thousand), burglary (285,000; 5 per thousand) and vehicle theft (150,000; 3 per thousand). England and Wales has a prison population of over 80,000 (2007 estimate), equivalent to 149 people per 100,000. This is considerably less than the USA (762) but more than the Republic of Ireland (76). and a little more than the EU average (123).

In 2007–8, there were 114 homicide victims in Scotland, a slight decrease on the previous year. In the third quarter of 2009, there were a little over 17,000 full time equivalent serving police officers. There were around 375,000 crimes in 2008–9, a fall of 2% on the previous year. These included around 12,500 non-sexual violent acts, 168,000 crimes of dishonesty (housebreaking, theft and shoplifting are included in this category) and 110,000 acts of fire-raising and vandalism. In the 2008–9 period, there was a prison population in Scotland of about 7,300, equating to 142 people per 100,000 population, very similar to England and Wales.

Between April 2008 and 2009, there were just over 110,000 crimes recorded by the Police Service of Northern Ireland, an increase of 1.5% on the previous year. Northern Ireland has around 7,500 serving full-time equivalent police positions, and a prison population of 1,500, 83 per 100,000 of the population, lower than the rest of the United Kingdom.