Crime is falling—but the public doesn't feel safer, UK study finds

This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Crime levels are falling for most offenses across the UK—but the public doesn't necessarily feel safer. It's a human trait to focus on frightening information in the news or on social media—but it could also mean that people are more fearful about crime than they need to be.

Reform UK's leader Nigel Farage claimed last month that "everyone knows" law and order in the UK is in a worse place than it was five or ten years ago. Farage was launching a new Reform policy document called Keeping Criminals Behind Bars. More than eight in ten of the British public really do believe that crime has gone up in the past few years.

But as a study I was recently involved in shows, this sense of increasing lawlessness is based on very faulty perceptions of trends in actual crime rates. Eight in ten of the UK public think mobile phone thefts have increased since 2010 and around six in ten believe both vehicle-related thefts and burglary have increased. In fact, all are down by 50% or more over that time period.

These figures are based on the Crime Survey for England and Wales, which Farage has criticized as no longer fit for purpose. There are real challenges in accurately tracking crime over time, but the Office for Statistics Regulation recently backed the study as a robust source of data on crime trends. In any case, it is clear from our study that overly negative views of crime cannot be fully explained by one source being faulty.

The murder rate, measured by police crime statistics and difficult to argue with, has come down 20% since 2010. But our study found that two-thirds of the public think the number of murders has increased or remained the same. Our sense that things are going downhill extends to many features of criminal justice.

Police numbers in England and Wales have increased by 20% since 2018, but only 4% of us get that right. Two-thirds think numbers have fallen. We're particularly wrong when our concerns about different areas of life connect, for example, when crime is linked to immigration.