Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of current levels of (1) knife crime, (2) anti-social behaviour, and (3) gun crime, in England and Wales.
The ONS published the findings from the Crime Survey for England and Wales (for year ending March 2020) on 8 September 2020, which included a section on perceptions of anti-social behaviour (ASB) incidents. The report noted that 7% of all adults in England and Wales reported a high-level of perceived ASB, a similar proportion to the year ending March 2019 and an overall reduction in the perception of high-levels of ASB since 2003 (21%). Furthermore, firearms offences recorded by the police in England and Wales decreased by 7% in the year ending September 2020, compared with the previous year (to 6,242 offences). And offences involving the use of knives or sharp instruments decreased by 3% over the same period (to 47,119 offences).