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Crime booming in
North Yorkshire
ROBBERY and violent crime is surging in rural areas, according to official figures released at the weekend - and North Yorkshire has seen the second-biggest increase in England and Wales.
Robberies in North Yorkshire increased by a massive 17% in the past 12 months - second only to a 25% surge in Norfolk - which will come as a major shock to council tax payers, who have seen their payments for the police force double in five years or so.
On average, crimes against the person have risen by almost 20% in rural areas, where many police stations in market towns like Skipton are only open office hours and many village stations have been closed permanently.
Many local residents fear that the widely-scattered police officers in the county - the biggest in England - spend too much time on paper-work pursuing Home Office targets. Others blame the increase in violence on late night drinking as pub-closing hours were widely extended last year.
Your views:
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Today's Daelnet news item tells me "Crime booming in North Yorkshire" - apparently robbery and violent crime are "surging".
Time for a reality check - crime in North Yorkshire has FALLEN for the third year running. It fell by 7.2% last year. Burglary is DOWN, autocrime is DOWN, sex offences are DOWN. And, since you mention it, violent crime is DOWN by 11%!
Robbery has gone up, it's true - by 40 incidents across the county's two million acres, the kind of statistical blip you get with very small numbers. Is that a "surge"?
It seems odd that if crime in North Yorkshire is "booming" the Home Office have recently confirmed that we have the lowest crime rate of any county in England...
And I see that once again you have erroneously claimed that police stations have closed in North Yorkshire. Yes, some have closed - but only to be replaced by better ones.
In running stories like this without checking does two things: It makes your readers doubt the accuracy of all your news items, and wild fantasies about surging crime just make people afraid unneccesarily.
Tony Lidgate - North Yorkshire Police Press Officer
Editors Note:
Daelnet has published a response to this feedback: Click here to read our article.
