- What are your goals?
- We want the entire system to focus on the tiny number of career criminals who commit most crime and lock them up for longer. Career criminals should get longer sentences with each new crime. And the worst should be kept in for life (or until they are physically unable to harm anyone).
- We want the government to reverse the collapse of the court system. We have a huge backlog. Rape cases are now delayed over three years heading for four. We need more courts, faster courts, 24/7 courts to crush the backlog.
- We need urgent building of more prison and secure hospital places in 2025 -- no more ‘plans’ to build things in a decade while we wait for lawyers to become millionaires with planning and environmental inquiries. There are other things which we will explain as the campaign develops.
- How do you know 10% of offenders commit 50% of crimes? The MoJ released data spanning two decades which showed this. Their 2016 publication showed prolific offenders were responsible for ~52% of convictions, and their 2021 publication showed these offenders as responsible for ~44% of sentencing occasions. Falk et al's study of Sweden's national multi-generational register showed that just 1% of the population were responsible for 63% of violent crime, and in New York City in 2022, just 327 shoplifters were collectively arrested more than 6,000 times (nearly a third of all shoplifting arrests). Vollaard's study of Dutch offenders contained a sample with an average of 31 previous recorded offences who admitted to 256 crimes each per year.
- Why do you say you can crush crime rates by up to 90%? 50% refers to all crime, but theft is the most common crime type for prolific offenders to engage in. For example, concentrated efforts by police to target prolific offenders have seen reductions in reports of 64%, 72%, and 90%. So if we jail career criminals for longer, we will stop somewhere between 50-90% of crime.
- Why do you say there are so many more crimes than just those reported? The CSEW estimates that, on average, 41% of CSEW comparable crimes were recorded by police. There is considerable variation between crime types (e.g CSEW estimate ~32% bike thefts are recorded), and estimates exist from other sources (5 in 6 women and 4 in 5 men do not report rape, 42% of retail crime reported by retailers). Vollaard's sample again demonstrates this, with each offender on average admitting to over 8 times as many offences as they had recorded.
- How do you know offenders commit many more crimes than they are charged with? It is typical for offenders to commit many more crimes than they are charged and/or convicted for, and this is displayed in academic literature. When anonymity is guaranteed, offenders in this sample admitted on average 25 offences per conviction. In this Dutch study of shoplifters, offenders had on average 31 recorded offences, but admitted 256 offences per year.
- What are the 10 worst constituencies for overall crime?
- Cities of London and Westminster (89,446 crimes in the last year)
- Birmingham Ladywood (38,111 crimes in the last year)
- Holborn and St Pancras (36,090 crimes in the last year)
- Liverpool Riverside (32,482 crimes in the last year)
- Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West (31,141 crimes in the last year)
- Blackpool South (29,392 crimes in the last year)
- Middlesbrough and Thornaby East (29,019 crimes in the last year)
- Leeds South (28,020 crimes in the last year)
- Kensington and Bayswater (26,796 crimes in the last year)
- Nottingham East (24,612 crimes in the last year)
- Why do you say that Greater Manchester Police do not provide crime data? Per the changelog on the police data website: “Greater Manchester Police: Due to a change in IT systems no crime, outcome or stop and search data is available from July 2019 onwards. The force are working to rectify this issue and provide the missing data over the coming months”. Additionally, GMP scored a 1 out of 4 ('inadequate') in this HMIC inspection.
- I’ve heard that crime is decreasing, but you say some crime types are increasing - which ones are these?
- Phone theft has increased by ~150%
- Knife crime increased by 20% in 2023 from 2022
- And based on police recorded crime from 2002 - 2023:
- Death or serious injury from unlawful driving has increased by ~269%
- Violence against the person offences have increased by ~180%
- Sexual offences have increased by ~243%
- Drug offences have increased by ~27%
- Public order offences have increased by ~262%
- Shoplifting offences have increased by ~51%
In that time, the population of England & Wales has increased by ~16%. It is possible that police are recording more of the above crimes, but as we know police recorded crimes represent a fraction of the true picture, so it is likely that these crimes have increased.