Police-recorded crimes including rape, general sexual offences, and violence against the person have hit an all-time high since comparable records began in 2002.
Fully 6.3 million crimes were recorded in England and Wales in the year to March 2022 — a double-digit increase of 16 per cent on the previous year, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
So-called high-harm offences appear to have increased even more sharply, with homicides up 25 per cent to 710 and sexual offences up 32 per cent to astonishing 194,683 offences.
This includes the highest number of rape offences yet recorded, at 70,330.
Knife crime, a perennial issue in Britain, was up by a comparatively modest 10 per cent to 49,027 offences, with the ONS noting that all forms of knife-enabled violent and sexual crimes increased with the sole exception of attempted murder.
While this seems somewhat paradoxical, the authorities seem at times to be strangely reluctant to acknowledge actions that very much resemble an attempt to kill as attempted murder — as in the case of Afghan career criminal Hamid Akhonzada, who forced a teenager to the floor of a public bus and “held his head back and drew a bladed article described as a steak knife across the throat” but was only prosecuted for “wounding with intent”, for example.
Crimes of violence against the person in general increased by 18 per cent to some 2.1 million.
“Police-recorded crime shows some indications of violent offences returning to or exceeding levels seen before the pandemic,” commented Billy Gazard for the Office for National Statistics.
“Sexual offences recorded by the police were at the highest level recorded within a 12-month period in the year ending March 2022, a 32 per cent increase from the previous year,” he emphasised — but added that such changes “may reflect a number of factors including the impact of high-profile cases and campaigns on victims’ willingness to report incidents.”
Better recording and more people coming forward — as opposed to society becoming increasingly lawless amid a breakdown in social cohesion — is often trotted out as an excuse for worsening crime statistics by politicians and officials.
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