Crime Statistics Consultation

The Ministry of Justice today launched a consultation which aims to make statistics covering the Criminal Justice System more transparent and user friendly. A copy of the consultation document and details of how to respond can be found on our website:

http://www.justice.gov.uk/consultations/statistics-cp171110.htm

The 'Consultation on improvements to Ministry of Justice statistics' seeks views on:
• the definitions of statistics - making the statistics consistent across MoJ publications and clarifying the definition of certain important measurements.
• introducing a quarterly criminal justice statistics bulletin. This would give an overview of trends in crime, out of court disposals, prosecutions, convictions and sentencing.
• moving to a single measure of re-offending. This would get rid of the six different ways re-offending is measured. This includes consolidating five separate publications on re-offending into a single publication.
These proposals represent significant improvements by:

• making a wider range of data available routinely through our statistical publications;
• presenting a coherent overview of criminal justice statistics to help understanding and ease of comparison; and
• simplifying access to information in line with the National Statistics Code of Practice.
The consultation is a response to a number of separate reports including the UK Statistics Authority Assessment of Criminal Justice Studies, the Stern Review of Rape Reporting and UK Statistics Authority's Barrier to Trust in Crime Statistics as well as our own internal review of criminal justice publications.
The closing date for responses is 18 February 2011 and responses can be submitted by email, post or by using the online survey. If you have any questions about the consultation, please contact: statistics.enquiries@justice.gsi.gov.uk