Criminal Trends
| DOI | 10.1350/jcla.2010.74.6.661 |
| Date | 01 December 2010 |
| Published date | 01 December 2010 |
| Author | David Kirk |
| Subject Matter | Opinion |
OPINION
Criminal Trends
David Kirk*
Chief Criminal Counsel, Financial Services Authority
What are we to believe about trends in criminal justice? On the one
hand, good news was to be found in the statistics published by the Home
Office in July 2010, based on figures produced by the British Crime
Survey and ‘police recorded crime’: ‘Both the 2009/10 BCS and police
recorded crime are consistent in showing falls in overall crime compared
with 2008/9’.1The findings were that crime overall had decreased by
about 9 per cent, with vehicle crime down by 16 per cent, and domestic
burglary by 9 per cent. Even credit card fraud showed a 16 per cent
reduction in value and a 2 per cent reduction in the number of fraudu-
lent transactions.
Less comforting was the report from the National Fraud Authority in
January 2010, which produced figures stating that fraud costs the UK
£30 billion a year,2considerably more than the £13 billion estimated by
Professor Michael Levi in 2007.3Levi commented that the NFA meas-
urement ‘. . . is just the beginning. We now need to use this data to
reflect on what we can do about our vulnerabilities and what we need
from ourselves and from others to tackle them better’. It is, however,
difficult for the police to tackle fraud, and therefore much of the NFA’s
activity (and that of its close relations, the National Fraud Reporting
Centre and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau) is geared towards
recording information and analysing trends. The NFA has rightly em-
phasised that dealing with this type of criminal activity is as much a
matter of disruption, public education and enhanced protection of the
technology most of us now depend on as it is a matter of police activity.
Prevention is better than cure.4
* The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily
reflect the views of the Financial Services Authority or The Journal of Criminal Law.
1 J. Flatley, C. Kershaw, K. Smith, R. Chaplin and D. Moon (eds), Crime in England and
Wales 2009/10: Findings from the British Crime Survey and Police Recorded Crime, 2nd edn
(Home Office: July 2010) 2, available at http://rds.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs10/hosb1210.
pdf, accessed 4 October 2010.
2 National Fraud Authority, National Fraud Authority Annual Fraud Indicator, January
2010, available at http://www.attorneygeneral.gov.uk/nfa/GuidetoInformation/Documents/
NFA_fraud_indicator.pdf, accessed 4 October 2010.
3 M. Levi, J. Burrows, M. H. Fleming and M. Hopkins, The Nature, Extent and Economic
Impact of Fraud in the UK: Report for the Association of Chief Police Officers’
Economic Crime Portfolio, (ACPO: 2007), available at http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/socsi/
resources/ACPO%20final%20nature%20extent%20and%20economic%20impact%20of
%20fraud.pdf, accessed 4 October 2010.
4 The NFA’s 8 Strategic Objectives for 2010/11 stress information sharing, self-
protection and prevention, and support and advice for fraud victims. Objective 7: ‘To
ensure there is an appropriate balance in the criminal justice system between fraud
prevention and disruption and the use of criminal justice powers and that the
criminal and civil enforcement measures used against fraudsters are as effective as
possible.’
487The Journal of Criminal Law (2010) 74 JCL 487–489
doi:10.1350/jcla.2010.74.6.661
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