Big crime rise after five-year fall

THE HOME Office is admitting that crime is on the rise after falling for five years in succession. Large increases in criminal behaviour have been recorded by police forces across the country. They are being collated by Home Office statisticians who are also forecasting that crime will continue to rise for the next few years.

Jack Straw, the Home Secretary, yesterday appeared to prepare the ground for a disclosure that crime was up. The official figures for the past year will not be published until October, but Mr Straw said that although crime "went down for the first two year of this government; the thing is whether it's going to stay down", he added: "I work on the basis we have to keep our effort up and keep the crime rate down."

Mr Straw conceded yesterday that the forthcoming figures are already expected to rise by as much as 20 per cent due to a more accurate method of counting incidents, which was introduced in the past year. But he also said that it "remained to be seen" what the trend would be this year.

Even taking the new system into account the underlying crime rate is also expected to go up. Officials were saying privately yesterday that the rise would be significant, although not "double digit" in percentage terms.

After overseeing a drop of nearly 8 per cent to 4.6 million reported offences in England and Wales in the year up to March 1998, any increase in recorded offences will be seized on by the Government's critics as evidence that current anti-crime measures are failing. A rising crime rate during the run up to the next general election would be a major blow for Labour, which has continued to campaign on being "tough on crime and the causes of crime".

The Metropolitan Police, one of the few forces to disclose statistics so far, revealed that crime rose 15 per cent, totalling 270,000 in May, June and July, compared with the same period the previous year.

In the West Midlands the number of reported crimes rose by 18 per cent to 315,000 for the year ending April 1999. Chief Constable Edward Crew has blamed changes in the way the Home Office records crime for much of the increase. The biggest rise, however, was in categories unaffected by the new counting system - drugs trafficking rose by 19 per cent, and wounding and assaults were up 12 per cent.

In a reappraisal of previous thinking, Home Office statisticians are also predicting that Britain's booming economy and a surge in the number of young men is expected to push up the crime rate further A report, circulated to chief constables, forecasts that property crime could rise by up to 40 per cent within the next three years.

The new crime model takes into account a rise in birth rates since a slump in the mid-1970s. That would mean a new generation of youngsters reaching criminal maturity.

Experts say they now believe that a successful economy has a bad long- term effect on crime. During a boom an initial "feelgood" period, which sees the number of offences drop as people earn more, is replaced with a crime spate as the number of valuable goods, such as cars and computers, increases and thieves have more opportunities to make easy cash.

While the Government and police have been successful in reducing property crime, particularly burglary and car theft, they have failed to stem a rise in violent and sexual offences.

To show the importance placed on winning the fight against crime, Mr Straw announced yesterday that he and his Home Office ministers are to visit 13 towns and cities across England and Wales over the next month to examine the progress of crime-fighting partnerships involving police, councils and other organisations.