What do we know about knife crime levels since 2010?

“The shadow Minister should be aware that according to the crime survey of England and Wales —the only reliable long-term indicator for volume crime trends, according to the Office for National Statistics—violent crime is down by 51% since 2010.”

In Parliament on Monday 26 February Labour’s shadow minister for policing Alex Norris MP claimed that knife crime was “up by 70% since 2015”.

In response, policing minister Chris Philp MP said that “violent crime is down by 51% since 2010”.

Mr Philp’s figure is based on statistics from the Crime Survey of England and Wales, which Mr Philp described as “the only reliable long-term indicator for volume crime trends, according to the Office for National Statistics”.

Last month, the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak made a similar claim when responding to a question about knife crime from Labour MP Kim Johnson during Prime Minister’s Questions, saying “we have cut violent crime in half since 2010”.

Crime Survey data does show that “violent crime” offences have decreased by 51% between the year ending March 2010 and the year ending September 2023. But when it comes to knife crime specifically, these aren’t the most relevant figures.

While the ONS describes Crime Survey data as a “better indicator of long-term trends” than police recorded crime data “for the crime types and population it covers”, it specifically states that: “Police recorded crime provides a better measure than the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) of higher-harm but less common types of violence, such as those involving a knife or sharp instrument (knife-enabled crime).”

That’s because knife crime accounts for a very small proportion of offences, meaning sample-based surveys, like the CSEW, aren’t a particularly good way to detect changes in the level of knife crime. CSEW data does not include specific figures for “knife crime”.

The ONS publishes data on select serious offences involving a knife or sharp instrument. These offences include homicide, attempted murder, threats to kill, various kinds of assault, robbery, rape and sexual assault (but don’t include possession of an offensive weapon offences involving a knife or sharp instrument). ONS data for England and Wales shows the number of police recorded offences involving a knife or sharp instrument is higher now than in March 2011 (the first year for which this data was published). 

We’ve seen Labour claim there has been a 70% increase in knife crime a number of times, based on previous police recorded crime updates. The most recent data covering the year to September 2023 shows an 80% increase in police recorded serious knife crime offences since the year ending March 2015 (this figure excludes Greater Manchester Police and Devon and Cornwall police due to issues affecting these forces’ ability to provide data).

However, as the ONS says, caution is required when making direct comparisons using this data, as over this period there have been various changes in the categorisation of specific offences, as well as improvements in the way in which individual police forces collect and record data.

Statistics on their own have limitations. The way they are presented is a crucial part of how they are interpreted and understood by the public. If data is presented without context or caveats, it can give an incomplete or misleading picture. We’ve written previously about the difficulties surrounding knife crime data.

The Home Office also publishes police recorded crime figures. These differ a little to the ONS figures due to the way they are presented (for example, they cover slightly different time periods), but show broadly the same trend, though the same caveats apply when it comes to comparing changes over time.

Knife-related homicides

We do have data that’s directly comparable over time for the number of homicides involving a knife or sharp instrument.

Knives and sharp instruments are the most common method of killing, accounting for 41% of homicides in the year ending March 2023.

The data shows that the number of homicides involving a knife or other sharp instrument has increased overall since 2010. In the year ending March 2010 there were 209 recorded homicides involving a knife or sharp instrument, compared to 244 in the year ending March 2023.

Image courtesy of UK Parliament