Data on Society from the last quarter shows that reported violent crime continues to rise (albeit not as fast as overall crime) – the quarter to November saw over an eight per cent annual rise – with knife crime a key contributor to this. Meanwhile, Londoners’ concern about Brexit regains top spot in the issues index, overtaking the NHS.

Issues Index

Londoners’ concern about Brexit regains top spot in the Ipsos MORI Issues Index, overtaking the NHS. With London hospitals seemingly doing better than their national counterparts (see later in the issue), it is perhaps unsurprising there is a 6 point different between London and GB on this issue, though the poll was undertaken across the quarter (see appendix), before the current winter crisis took hold. Immigration, meanwhile, falls out of top six spontaneously-mentioned topics, and has been replaced by poverty/inequality, perhaps a reflection of the shifting political narrative in the capital and country.

Attractions monitor

Visitor numbers to over 60 of London’s top attractions – including museums, galleries and stadiums – fell by nearly 5 per cent in the quarter to September when compared to the previous year. The sharpest fall was in the summer months, when international visitor numbers were also down, and is perhaps linked to the impact of terror attacks in London and Manchester.

Crime

Total Notifiable Offences (TNOs) were at over 71,000 in November, a 13 per cent rise compared to the same month in 2016. For the quarter to November, reported offences were up 10 per cent on last year’s figures, and year-on-year rises have been at record highs for the last seven months.

Reported violent crime continues to rise (albeit not as fast as overall crime) – the quarter to November saw over an eight per cent annual rise – with knife crime a key contributor to this. This continuing escalation has led the Mayor to continue to take action – policies announced this year include increased stop and search powers and an extra £15m to tackle knife crime.

Other figures (for the year to September) revealed a rise in robberies and vehicle thefts, which links to the well-publicised spate of moped thefts in the capital in the autumn.

The latest crime figures are puzzling. On the one hand, according to the Office for National Statistics, overall crime levels as measured by the Crime Survey for England and Wales, have continued to fall across the country. On the other hand, as the London data here shows, crime recorded by the police has increased. What explains this difference? Some of the increase in reported crime is the result of more victims coming forward in areas where reporting has been traditionally low, such as sexual crime and domestic abuse. Some of the increase is due to better recording of some types of crime by the police. But it is also true that there are some genuine increases in some serious offences, including knife crime and vehicle related thefts, in particular moped-enabled robbery. The increase in knife crime has led to the Met stepping up the use of stop and search tactics. We should watch the next round of data closely to assess whether this has any impact.

Rick Muir – Director, The Police Foundation

Rough sleeping and homelessness

The total number of rough sleepers in the capital rose slightly in the third quarter of last year, to nearly 2,700. The data suggests that nearly 400 of these people live on the streets, with their numbers concentrated in central London. In addition nearly 4,500 households in the capital fitted the statutory definition of homelessness that calls for local authority support (at a rate more than double the rest of the UK).

Road safety

Total reported incidents on London’s roads which resulted in a casualty stood at over 8,000 in the second quarter of 2017. There were 20 fatalities, which is the second lowest quarterly figure in the last five years.

A new measurement system makes it difficult to compare the severity of outcomes from September 2016 onwards with those previously, but recent research has shown that the 13 most dangerous roads in Britain are all in London – the worst nationally is the A1010, from Tottenham to Waltham Cross, which has an accident rate of 12.7 accidents per million miles driven, versus the national average of 1.48.