Lynne's Parliament and Haringey diary

Metropolitan Police Authority full board meeting. I table a report as a Member's Update on 'unreported crime'. I have completed a survey in Hornsey & Wood Green on crime in general - and because of my special interest and responsibility for holding the Met to account on police response, I had inserted a section on unreported crime.

My thesis has been that people in quite large numbers don't bother to report low-level crime because they can't easily access the police locally, they don't believe the police will do anything if they do get
hold of them and/or they don't think the crime important enough to bother the police with.

Given that police resources are targeted on where crime is reported, if my thesis were correct, lots of places that needed police resources would not be getting them for this reason.

Anyway - I needed some evidence to support my theory - hence the survey. The furore at the MPA was fun - though also just the sort of silliness which puts people off politics. The Tories were furious with me for doing it - but did concede that unreported crime was a big issue.

Sir John Stevens (Met Police Commissioner) said I was right in what I was saying and that it was an
important area for the police to focus on.

If people don't have confidence and trust that the police will act, all the extra police on the streets will not make people feel safer. The Evening Standard ran with it - and the work will now be taken on through a sub-committee to address the issue.

Labels: crime, mpa