Official Statistics

Police recorded crime and outcomes open data tables user guide

Updated 24 October 2024

Applies to England and Wales

1. Introduction

This document contains information on the content and use of the Home Office Open Data tables for:

1. Police recorded crime

2. Crime outcomes (including Alternate Charges and Cautions)

3. Transferred/cancelled records (formerly ‘no-crimes’)

4. Offences involving knives or sharp instruments

5. Offences involving firearms

6. Hate crime

7. Rape incidents and crimes

8. Supplementary Outcomes Metrics

Please refer to the corresponding sections in this document for the required information on each set of open data tables.

2. Police recorded crime and outcomes: open data tables

2.1 Introduction

It is recommended that this User Guide to should be read in conjunction with the Office for National Statistics (ONS) User Guide to Crime Statistics User guide to crime statistics for England and Wales: March 2023. The ONS User Guide provides important context on the scope and limitations of police recorded crime (PRC) statistics as a whole. PRC figures can be considerably affected by changes in recording policy and practice and it is important to consider the impact of such changes when analysing time series based on PRC data or comparing between different police force areas. In particular, significant changes to recording policy in 2002/03, including the introduction of the National Crime Recording Standard (NCRS), mean that figures are not directly comparable before and after this period. The impact of the 2002/03 and preceding changes varied by crime type, with violent crime particularly affected. These tables only contain data from the period following the introduction of NCRS.

More recently, in the wake of a critical national inspection of crime recording by HM Inspectorate of Police, Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) in 2014, there have been significant improvements in the accuracy of crime recording which has led to a discontinuity in several crime types including violence against the person, sexual offences and public order offences.

Many of the notes in this section apply to the open data for outcomes, transferred and cancelled records, offences involving knives or sharp instruments and hate crime. Additional guidance is also provided for these open data tables.

2.2 Table format

The main release consists of data tables, covering financial years since 2002/03.

Data is provided in .ods format which can be opened by most spreadsheet software. The data is provided with one financial year per worksheet, which are named accordingly.

In addition to the main tables, 2 additional reference tables have been included in this release. See section Section 2.4 Reference data tables below for more information on these.

2.3 Data table specification

Police recorded crime

Data tables are laid out in rows and columns. Each row contains a single count of crime, with each column containing information about that count, such as the time period, offence and area that it applies to.

	Possible Values	Description
Financial Year	Various	Combined with the Financial Quarter column, this identifies the period during which offences were initially recorded which will be when the crime was reported to the police. Each financial year runs from April to March.
Financial Quarter	Various	Combined with Financial Year column, this identifies the period during which offences were recorded by the police. Quarter 1 runs from April-June, Quarter 2 from July-September, Quarter 3 from October-December, and Quarter 4 from January-March.
Force Name	Various (See reference table)	This column identifies the police force area within which the offence was recorded. This will generally be the same area where the offence took place. The reference table ‘PRC Geog reference table.csv’ shows how these areas map up to regions within England and Wales.
CSP Name (CSP tables only)	Various (See reference table)	This column identifies the Community Safety Partnership Area in which offences were recorded. This is a geographic area which generally corresponds to single or combined Local Authority boundaries. The reference table ‘PRC Geog reference table.csv’ shows how these areas map up to police force areas and regions within England and Wales.
Offence Description	Various (See reference table)	This column provides a description of the offence covered by each Offence Code value.
Offence Group	Various (See reference table)	This column identifies the offence group within which the Offence Code falls. Each groups also consists of Offence Sub-groups, which in turn consist of Offence Codes.
Offence Subgroup	Various (See reference table)	This column identifies the offence sub-group within which the Offence Code falls. These sub-groups contain Offence Codes.
Offence Code	Various (See reference table)	This column identifies the specific offence code used by the police and the Home Office to classify offences. The reference table ‘Ref-Offence.csv’ shows descriptions of these codes, as well as the offence groups that they map up to.
Number of Offences	Various (See reference table)	This column contains the total number of police recorded crimes for the specified Offence Code, CSP Name/Force Name and time period (Financial Year and Financial Quarter).

In addition to figures for police force areas (PFAs), since 2011/12 the PFA open data tables include data for each quarter showing the number of fraud offences centrally recorded by Action Fraud, Cifas and Financial Fraud UK. These are indicated in the Force Name, Offence Subgroup and Offence Code columns.

2.4 Reference data tables

There are 2 reference data tables included with this release. One of these covers geographic data, while the other covers offence code data.

2.5 Geographic reference table

	Possible Values	Description
CSP Name	Various	This includes all values in the CSP Name column of the main data tables.
Force Name	Various	This identifies the Police Force Area within which each CSP is located. It includes all values in the Force Name column of the main data tables.
Region	Various	This identifies the region of England and Wales within which the CSP/police force is located.
ONS Code	Various	This identifies a unique code, which corresponds to each CSP.

2.6 Offence reference table

	Possible Values	Description
Offence Code	Various	This includes all values in the Offence Code column of the main data tables.
Offence Description	Various	This column provides a description of the offence covered by each Offence Code value.
Old PRC Offence Group	Various	This column identifies the old (pre-July 2013) offence group within which the Offence Code falls.
Old PRC Offence Sub-group	Various	This column identifies the old (pre-July 2013) offence sub-group within which the Offence Code falls.
New PRC Offence Group	Various	This column identifies the new (post-July 2013) offence group within which the Offence Code falls.
New PRC Offence Sub-group	Various	This column identifies the new (post-July 2013) offence sub-group within which the Offence Code falls.

2.7 How to use PRC open data tables

At the simplest level, PRC open data tables can be used to find PRC figures for certain offences in certain time periods for certain areas. Figures are provided at the Police Force Area (PFA) and Community Safety Partnership (CSP) level.

In order to find the figures that the user is interested in, the user will need to filter or search data across different columns, and potentially sheets if interested in different years.

All of the figures in the tables are additive. In other words, to find figures for offences in a 12-month period for a particular PFA, figures for all 4 quarters of a 12-month period can be summed together.

Total police recorded crime figures from data presented at CSP level do not necessarily equal national police recorded crime figures presented elsewhere. British Transport Police data are excluded from the CSP level data.

‘Making off without payment’ (offence code 49A) was introduced as a separate offence code in April 2013, having previously been part of code 53B. A back series of data for this offence code is presented in these tables. Revised back data for offence code 49A have been included for the years 2002/03 to 2012/13 to provide a consistent time series. This involves a mixture of actual data provided by police forces, and estimated data.

From April 2017 a new classification of burglary offences was introduced. New sub-categories of residential and non-residential burglary have replaced domestic and non-domestic burglary respectively. The new classification of residential burglary includes all buildings or parts of buildings that are within the boundary of, or form a part of, a dwelling. From April 2023 a new classification of residential burglary offences was introduced, new sub-categories, residential (home) and residential (unconnected buildings) have been introduced. The new classification includes a breakdown of residential burglary from the main home and parts of buildings that are within the boundary of a dwelling.

2.8 Calculating crime rates

The PRC Open Data tables can be used to calculate crime rates for a PFA or CSP. This is possible by using the tables in combination with the Local Authority population data published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). These can be found on their Population estimates for England and Wales webpage.

The ONS also publish rates for the main crime types at CSP level. Rates at PFA level are available in published table P1, which can also be found in the Crime in England and Wales: Police Force Area data tables.

Because of the low volume of many crime types, rates are typically calculated per 1,000 population. This involves dividing the total number of crimes for a given area by the total population, and then multiplying by 1,000.

2.9 Accuracy of quarterly data

Due to the nature of the PRC data, a recorded crime can be subsequently deleted if it is subsequently transferred to another PFA or cancelled. The quarterly figures are revised every quarter to reflect this.

There may be occasions where there are negative numbers, prior to 2019, police forces were not required to resubmit data each time a crime record was transferred or cancelled. Instead forces would deduct the crime from the cumulative monthly returns that they supplied to the Home Office. This meant that in some quarters a negative value may be presented in the data. This system was designed to keep the figures accurate at a financial year level, and to reduce the burden on forces.

3. Crime outcomes open data

3.1 Introduction

In April 2013, a new outcomes framework was introduced, replacing the detections regime previously in place. The move from detections to outcomes was a marked change, with an emphasis on greater transparency on how all crimes recorded by the police were dealt with. The previous focus on detections gave a partial picture of the work police do to investigate and resolve crime, and its narrow focus was associated with performance targets which risked driving perverse behaviour with respect to crime recording decisions.

The full, broader outcomes framework was introduced in April 2014, and the statistical bulletin “Crime Outcomes in England and Wales 2014/15” published in July 2015 was the first publication based entirely on the full outcomes framework covering all possible investigative outcomes for crimes. Crime outcomes bulletins can be found in the Crime outcomes in England and Wales statistics collection.

3.2 Crime outcomes open data for 2014/15 onwards

To coincide with the publication of data on the broader outcomes framework, quarterly open data on crime outcomes have been published since 2014/15. Following consultation with users, open data on outcomes is now updated on a quarterly basis, since October 2015.

Outcomes data has been shown in 2 ways since 2014/15

1. Outcomes for offences that were recorded in the quarter. This approach links the outcome of the investigation to the individual crime that has been recorded. It reports on the outcomes of those investigations and includes an outcome to show investigations that remain open and have not been finalised. As such, when first published, each quarter’s data provides an incomplete picture of all investigations.As every crime will eventually receive an outcome, this measure can be used to see how the distribution of outcomes change over time. This is particularly effective for tracking those crimes, such as sexual offences, which can take a long time to investigate and reach a final outcome. Previously, this was referred to as a ‘new style’ of reporting since it was introduced when we were able to link outcomes to individual crime records. It replaced the previous method (see below), based on aggregate counts, which was then termed ‘old style’.

2. The total number of outcomes for investigations closed in the latest period, by outcome type and offence type. These outcome volumes relate to outcomes recorded in that year regardless of when the associated crime was recorded. Rates can be calculated as the number of outcomes recorded in the year as a proportion of crimes recorded in the same year. This is how rates were presented before it was possible to link crimes with their outcomes. It is still useful to look at outcomes in this way as an additional measure of police activity in any given time period.

Comparing the number of outcomes with the number of recorded offences in this way should be done with caution, because some outcomes relate to offences recorded in previous years. Some crime types could show a rate of over 100 per cent against a particular outcome, which is sometimes the case for relatively low volume crimes. Rates presented for outcomes recorded in the year are therefore illustrative rather than ‘true’ rates and can be influenced by changes in crime volumes. This has been a particular issue since 2014 when improvements in crime recording has driven large rises in the volume of crimes recorded within specific offence groups.

Outcome types

Outcome 1: Charge / Summons: A person has been charged or summonsed for the crime (irrespective of any subsequent acquittal at Court).

Outcome 2: Caution – youths: A youth offender has been cautioned by the police.

Outcome 3: Caution – adults: An adult offender has been cautioned by the police.

Outcome 4: Taken into Consideration (TIC): The offender admits the crime by way of a formal police interview and asks for it to be taken into consideration by the court. There must be an interview where the suspect has made a clear and reliable admission of the offence and which is corroborated with additional verifiable auditable information connecting the suspect to the crime.

Outcome 5: Offender died: The offender has died before proceeding could be initiated.

Outcome 6: Penalty Notices for Disorder: A Penalty Notice for Disorder (or other relevant notifiable offence) has been lawfully issued under Section 1 – 11 of the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001.

Outcome 7: Cannabis/Khat Warning: A warning for cannabis or khat possession has been issued in accordance with College of Policing guidance. Note: Khat Warnings were introduced from 24 June 2014 and numbers are likely to be small.

Outcome 8: Community Resolution: A Community Resolution (with or without formal Restorative Justice) has been applied in accordance with College of Policing guidance.

Outcome 9: Not in public interest (CPS): Prosecution not in the public interest (CPS decision). The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) by virtue of their powers under the Criminal Justice Act 2003 decides not to prosecute or authorise any other formal action.

Outcome 10: Not in public interest (Police) (from April 2014): Formal action against the offender is not in the public interest (Police decision).

Outcome 11: Prosecution prevented – suspect under age (from April 2014): Prosecution prevented – named suspect identified but is below the age of criminal responsibility.

Outcome 12: Prosecution prevented – suspect too ill (from April 2014): Prosecution prevented – Named suspect identified but is too ill (physical or mental health) to prosecute.

Outcome 13: Prosecution prevented – victim/key witness dead/too ill (from April 2014): Named suspect identified but victim or key witness is dead or too ill to give evidence

Outcome 14: Evidential difficulties: suspect not identified; victim does not support further action (from April 2014): Evidential difficulties victim based – named suspect not identified. The crime is confirmed but the victim declines or is unable to support further police action to identify the offender.

Outcome 15: Evidential difficulties (suspect identified; victim supports action) (from April 2014): Evidential difficulties named suspect identified – the crime is confirmed and the victim supports police action but evidential difficulties prevent further action. This includes cases where the suspect has been identified, the victim supports action, the suspect has been circulated as wanted but cannot be traced and the crime is finalised pending further action.

Outcome 16: Evidential difficulties: suspect identified; victim does not support further action (from April 2014): Evidential difficulties victim based – named suspect identified. The victim does not support (or has withdrawn support from) police action.

Outcome 17: Prosecution time limit expired (from April 2014): Suspect identified but prosecution time limit has expired (from April 2014).

Outcome 18: Investigation complete – no suspect identified (from April 2014): The crime has been investigated as far as reasonably possible – case closed pending further investigative opportunities becoming available.

Outcome 19: National Fraud Intelligence Bureau filed (NFIB only) (from April 2014): A crime of fraud has been recorded but has not been allocated for investigation because the assessment process at the NFIB has determined there are insufficient lines of enquiry to warrant such dissemination.

Outcome 20: Action undertaken by another body/agency (from April 2015): Further action resulting from the crime report will be undertaken by another body or agency other than the police, subject to the victim (or person acting on their behalf) being made aware of the action being taken. Note: during 2014/15, these were included within outcome 18.

Outcome 21: Not in the public interest – suspect identified (from January 2016): Further investigation resulting from the crime report that could provide evidence sufficient to support formal action being taken against the suspect is not in the public interest – police decision. Note: previously these offences could have received any outcome type.

Outcome 22: Diversionary, educational or intervention activity, resulting from the crime report, has been undertaken and it is not in the public interest to take any further action (voluntary from April 2019, and compulsory from April 2021)

New outcomes introduced from April 2016

It is possible for a crime to be recorded and for the suspect to be charged or cautioned but for that charge or caution to be for an offence other than that recorded. The recording standards reflect the law and in reaching charging decisions the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) set out a range of standards and guidance that both they themselves and the police, in cases where the police are the charging decision makers, must follow.

These standards may frequently dictate that an alternative is to be charged to that recorded. For example, an assault may be recorded as a crime of Actual Bodily Harm (because that is the offence in law committed) but the CPS will direct that the offence to be charged is one of Common Assault. Therefore, in April 2016 3 new outcomes were introduced on a voluntary basis until they become mandatory in April 2017. These outcomes reflect where the charge/summons (outcome 1A), youth caution (outcome 2A) or adult caution (outcome 3A) relates to an alternative offence to that recorded. These outcomes are included within outcomes 1, 2 and 3 accordingly.

They are published separately under a ‘Alternate outcomes open tables from April 2015’

Data Quality

The Home Office receives monthly data from police forces on crime, crime outcomes and records that were initially recorded as crimes and subsequently transferred to another police force or cancelled. This data is quality assured and analysed by Home Office statisticians and any anomalies or errors identified through this process result in a report being returned to the relevant force for validation or correction.

Prior to the publication of crime outcomes a verification exercise is carried out with all forces. The data held by the Home Office are summarised and returned to individual forces asking for confirmation that the data accords with that held on their own systems and to highlight any perceived inconsistencies in their data. Again, forces resubmit data if required.

The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) previously worked with the Home Office, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) to deliver a project to make the use of out-of-court disposals for adult offenders more effective. In November 2014, as part of this project, 3 police forces (Leicestershire, Staffordshire and West Yorkshire) commenced a 12-month pilot operation of a simplified model of such outcomes (West Yorkshire Police adopted a phased roll-out starting in November 2014 and fully operational in January 2015). All 3 forces, with the agreement of Ministers, voluntarily stopped issuing adult simple cautions (part of outcome 3) and cannabis or khat warnings (outcome 7) and limited their use of Penalty Notices for Disorder (outcome 6), instead using the adult conditional caution (part of outcome 3) and the community resolution (outcome 8).

The rules and guidance that apply to conditional cautions and community resolutions have been amended for those 3 forces to reflect this new approach. These 3 pilot forces have continued to operate in accordance with the pilot conditions since the pilot ended in November 2015. Some other forces have subsequently also limited their use of some out of court disposals. This may lead to apparent falls in some of these outcome types (for example, cannabis or khat warnings) which may be accompanied by increases in outcomes 3 and 8 which will have been used in their place.

3.3 Outcomes open data tables for previous years (2005/06 to 2013/14)

Historically, outcome statistics were published on an annual basis, with the statistics published covering the previous financial year.

The full, broader outcomes framework wasn’t introduced until April 2014, and so the outcome types available in the open data tables for previous years are shown below. The outcome data available for the year 2013/14 are based on broadly similar outcome types to those presented in 2012/13. The information below should be considered when drawing comparisons across years, because in several cases there have been changes in outcome recording practices over time. This is particularly true for the Cannabis Warning and ‘other’ categories and so comparisons should be done with caution.

1. Charge/summons

A person has been charged or summonsed for the crime (irrespective of any subsequent acquittal at court).

2. Caution

An offender has been cautioned by the police (including conditional cautions) or given a reprimand or warning under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.

3. Offence taken into consideration (TIC)

The offender admits the crime by way of a PACE compliant interview and asks for it to be taken into consideration by the court.

4. Penalty Notice for Disorder (PND)

The police issue a Penalty Notice for Disorder (PND). Such a notice must be issued in accordance with any operational guidance to the police (for example, Police Operational Guidance on PNDs issued by the Home Office in March 2005). An outcome is counted if the penalty notice is not contested, is contested but the CPS proceeds with the case, or, in discontinued cases, the dedicated decision maker reviews the case and stands by the original decision.

With effect from 26 January 2009, it became possible for a PND to be given for an offence of cannabis possession. For central reporting purposes any such PNDs were counted as

Cannabis Warnings for the period January to March 2009. From April 2009 a system was put in place to correctly record them as PNDs for the relevant offence.

5. Cannabis Warning

A warning for cannabis possession has been issued in accordance with guidance from the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO).

Prior to January 2007 this was known as a ‘formal warning for cannabis possession’. From April 2004 information on police formal warnings for cannabis possession started to be collected centrally (prior to this a pilot scheme was run in parts of London). Those aged 18 and over who are caught in simple possession of cannabis can be eligible for a police Cannabis Warning, which would not involve an arrest.

6. Other

These outcomes are those where the offence is counted as dealt with but either no further action was taken against the offender, or the matter has been resolved by the use of a locally based community resolution or the application of Restorative Justice (RJ) techniques. There have been several changes in the outcome recording requirements for police forces over time, and so any comparison of data for this outcome type needs to be considered in this light.

a. No further action

Prior to April 2007 various reasons were allowed for claiming outcomes where no further action was taken against the offender. These included those where the:

• offender was too ill or mentally disturbed for proceedings to take place

• complainant or an essential witness was dead

• victim refused or was unable to give evidence

• offender was under the age of criminal responsibility

• police or the CPS decided that it would not be in the public interest to proceed

• time limit of 6 months for commencing prosecution had been exceeded

From April 2007 onwards, there were only 2 ways in which outcomes involving no further action could be claimed:

• where the offender dies before proceedings could be initiated or completed

• where the CPS decides not to prosecute (by virtue of its powers under the Criminal Justice Act 2003)

Additionally, the use of outcomes involving no further action was restricted to ‘indictable only’ offences (those offences which must be tried at Crown Court).

b. By local resolution

A special arrangement has been in place since 2008/09 to allow 8 forces piloting Youth Restorative Disposals (YRDs) to record their disposals under this category. Youth Restorative Disposals (YRDs) allow operational officers to dispose of low-level crime and neighbourhood disorder where it is not considered to be in the public interest to prosecute. The process involves a meeting between the offender and the victim, an apology and may also include additional action to right the wrong caused (for example, a form of community payback).

During 2011/12 and 2012/13, some forces (a small number in 2011/12 and around half in 2012/13) voluntarily submitted additional data on crimes dealt with by a community resolution. This included cases of Restorative Justice (RJ). RJ includes formal action, such as the Youth Restorative Disposal, administered by trained practitioners, as well as less formal community- based resolutions where the offender has made an admission and the victim is satisfied that such a resolution may be used. This may amount to an apology or agreement to carry out some activity, such as repairing damage caused.

In 2013/14, submitting data on community resolutions became mandatory, with almost all police forces doing so. As a result, caution should be used when comparing the ‘other’ outcome category between 2013/14 and previous years.

For more information on the circumstances in which these outcomes are assigned, please see the crime outcomes section of the relevant year’s Home Office Counting Rules.

The previous year’s statistical bulletin ‘Crime Outcomes in England and Wales 2013/14’ reflected the transition from the old detections to the new outcomes framework. As this was a transitional year, with a fuller, more detailed outcomes framework introduced subsequently in April 2014, the outcome data available for the year 2013/14 are based on broadly similar outcome types to those presented in 2012/13. The outcome types available in the open data tables are shown below. This information should be considered when drawing comparisons across years, because in several cases comparisons should be done with caution given the changes in outcome recording practices over time. This is particularly true for the ‘Cannabis Warning’ and ‘other’ categories.

See Police Recorded Crime Open Data Tables for more general information on police recorded crime.

3.4 Table format

The main release consists of 2 sets of data tables, covering financial years from 2005/06 to 2013/14 and 2014/15 onwards. Data is provided in .ods format which can be opened by most spreadsheet software. The data is provided with one financial year per worksheet, which are named accordingly.

3.5 Data table specification (2014/15 onwards)

Data tables are laid out in rows and columns. Each row contains a single count of outcomes, with each column containing information about that count, such as the time period, offence and area that it applies to.

	Possible Values	Description
Offence Code Expired (2014/15 onwards)	X	This column indicates whether the Offence Code had expired prior to April 2014, that is, whether outcomes recorded relate only to offences recorded in previous years.
Outcome Description	Various	This identifies which outcome type was assigned.
Outcome Group (2014/15 onwards)	Various (see Outcome Groups Reference Table above)	This identifies which outcome group was assigned.
Outcome Type (2014/15 onwards)	1-18, 20-22	This identifies the outcome number that corresponds to the outcome type assigned.
Outcomes for offences that were recorded in the quarter (2014/15 onwards)	Various	This column contains the total number of outcomes that were assigned to offences that were recorded for the specified Outcome Description, Outcome Group, Outcome Type, Offence Code, Force Name and time period (Financial Year and Financial Quarter).
Outcomes for investigations closed in the quarter	Various	This column contains the total number of outcomes that were recorded for the specified Outcome Description, Outcome Group, Outcome Type, Offence Code, Force Name and time period (Financial Year and Financial Quarter).

For other fields descriptions please see the previous see Section 2 Police Recorded Crime.

4. Transferred / cancelled records open data

4.1 Introduction

Transferred or cancelled records (formerly referred to as ‘no-crimes’) occur when a police force records an offence and later decides that the crime did not take place, was recorded in error or should be transferred to another police force. Since April 2015, police forces have supplied data to the Home Office split by the 5 reasons why the police may transfer or cancel records. It is important to note that cases where an incident was not recorded as a crime in the first place are not included.

4.2 Table format

The main release consists of data tables, covering financial years since 2014/15

Data is provided in .ods format which can be opened by most spreadsheet software. The data is provided with one financial year per worksheet, which are named accordingly.

4.3 Data table specification

Data tables are laid out in rows and columns. Each row contains a single count of crime, with each column containing information about that count, such as the time period, offence and area that it applies to.

	Description
Financial Year	This identifies the financial year in which an offence was recorded and transferred or cancelled. Each financial year runs from April to March.
Force Name	This column identifies the Police Force Area in which a record was transferred or cancelled.
Offence Type	These columns identify the type of offence that was transferred or cancelled.
Transferred/Cancelled Record Type	This column contains a number representing which of the 5 reasons why the record was transferred or cancelled (C1-C5).
Transferred/Cancelled Record Description	This column contains a description of the reason why the record was transferred or cancelled (5 different possible reasons – see list below).
Number of Transferred/Cancelled Records	This column contains the total number of records that were recorded and transferred or cancelled for the specified Offence Type, Force Name and Financial Year.

Reasons why record was transferred or cancelled:

C1: Transferred: Crime committed outside the jurisdiction of the police force in which it was recorded – passed to the appropriate force.

C2: Cancelled: Additional verifiable information that determines that no notifiable crime occurred becomes available.

C3: Cancelled: Duplicate record or part of a crime already recorded.

C4: Cancelled: Crime recorded in error.

C5: Cancelled: Self defence claimed (for specific recorded assaults).

4.4 How to use transferred/cancelled open data tables

At the simplest level, these open data tables can be used to find figures for transferred/cancelled records for certain offences in certain time periods for certain areas.

In order to find the figures that the user is interested in, the user will need to filter or search data across different columns.

5. Offences involving knives or sharp instruments open data

Open data tables are also provided for selected police recorded offences involving a knife or sharp instrument. Knives or sharp instruments are taken to be involved in an offence if they are used to stab or cut, or as a threat. The Home Office has collected data from the 43 police forces in England and Wales and the British Transport Police on selected offences involving knives and sharp instruments since April 2007. However, the open data table only includes data back to April 2008, due to a number of changes made to the collection after the first year. There were also changes made to the offence coverage in April 2012 and in April 2019.

The offences covered in this collection for the years 2008/09 to 2011/12 were:

• attempted murder

• threats to kill

• grievous bodily harm (GBH), both with and without intent

• actual bodily harm (ABH)

• Robbery

• rape

• sexual assault

In April 2012, there were changes to the offence codes for the assault offences. For the years 2012/13 to the present, the assault offences covered by this collection are assault with injury and assault with intent to cause serious harm. These assault categories are not directly comparable with the GBH/ABH offences recorded between 2008/09 and 2011/12. However, it is not thought that these changes greatly affected the totals for the assault offences.

In April 2019, the Home Office began the implementation of the National Data Quality Improvement Service (NDQIS), a computer-assisted classification tool which was developed to improve the quality of the offences involving knives or sharp instruments collection.

Previously, when a crime such as an assault or robbery was recorded by the police, a flag also had to be manually applied to that crime record if a knife or sharp instrument was involved. Because of this additional step, while the number of crimes recorded was correct, whether it was knife enabled or not may have been less accurately captured. Concerns were raised over the consistency of this approach, both over time and between police forces. There were also concerns over the consistency of the interpretation of the guidance by those responsible for flagging these offences.

Through a pilot with a number of police forces, the new process was shown to improve data quality and comparability. NDQIS has now been rolled out to 41 of the 44 forces as of October 2023. The ONS released a methodology report in 2021 outlining the new approach in greater detail.

As well as the introduction of the new approach, the coverage of the collection was also revised in April 2019. These changes were:

Clarification on when the use of a knife or sharp instrument as a threat should be recorded

The pilot showed this was an area where forces were interpreting the current guidance inconsistently. Some forces were including offences where a knife was not present (for example, the offender states “I will get a knife and stab you”) while other forces excluded these offences. New guidance has added a series of rules to ensure consistency between forces. These are:

The knife or sharp instrument should be present at the time of the offence – or believed to be present by the victim. This includes cases where the sharp instrument is not seen but the threat is believed, or only a knife handle is seen.

Certain types of threats should not be included:

• ‘remote threats’, for example, threats over social media to use a knife

• ‘future threats’– that is, offences where the perpetrator threatens to use a knife or sharp instrument in the future (for example “I will get a knife and stab you”)

• ‘idle threats’, such as where an offender says they will stab someone in passing but there is no evidence that a knife was present when the threat was made

The removal of broken bottles and glass from the collection

While sharp, these are weapons that are generally used in the heat of the moment without a premeditated motive. They tend to be involved in a different type of context to those involving knives or other sharp instruments. Removal of these type of offences align the collection closer to what the public would consider to be ‘knife crime’. Similarly, pens and pencils, while potentially sharp instruments, have also been removed. The collection still covers other sharp instruments that may be used in a similar way to knives, such as scissors, syringes and axes.

The addition of sharp tools, such as chisels and screwdrivers

The police have told us that these tools are carried and used in a similar premeditated way to knives.

The inclusion of sharp instruments when used as blunt instruments

This recognises that the use of sharp instruments, even as a blunt instrument, carries an implicit threat of serious harm. The victim will not know whether the offender will use the weapon to stab with the blade, or to strike with as a blunt instrument. This change also brings the collection in line with offences involving firearms, where firearms used as blunt instruments are included in the data.

Data for 2019/20 were collected from forces on both the old and new method and guidance. This allowed the previous time series to be adjusted to avoid a break in the series. However, since 2014, changes in practices and process by the police have meant there have been improvements in the coverage and recording of crimes reported. This has, in turn, contributed to the rises we have seen in police recorded crime, including in the knives or sharp instruments data.

Therefore, whilst we have been able to adjust the time series to take into account the new methodology and the change in coverage for the collection, data over the longer-term should still be treated with caution. Increases in the time series will be partly due to a genuine increase in these offences and partly due to improvements in recording across most forces.

The offences involving knives or sharp instruments open data tables are presented in 3 separate worksheets to reflect the changes to the assault offence codes and changes made in recording practice by Sussex and West Midlands police:

• 2008/09 to 2009/10 - assault offences are recorded under the old GBH/ABH offence codes and Sussex and West Midlands data include unbroken bottles and glass

• 2010/11 to 2011/12 - assault offences are recorded under the old GBH/ABH offence codes and Sussex and West Midlands data do not include unbroken bottles and glass

• 2012/13 to present - assault offences are assault with injury and assault with intent to cause serious harm and Sussex and West Midlands data do not include unbroken bottles and glass

The Home Office carry out internal quality assurance of the offences involving knife or sharp instruments data each quarter before publication. These checks include:

• a quarterly variation check of the data received from police forces – the total number of recorded crimes and the number recorded against each offence type are compared to the previous quarters’ figures to check for any vast deviations from the time series trend

• offences involving a knife or sharp instrument data are also verified with police forces on a quarterly basis ahead of publication

• the data held on the Home Office database is returned to individual forces asking for confirmation that the data accords with that held on their own systems; forces resubmit data if required

As with the main recorded crime open data tables, an offence involving a knife or sharp instrument can be either transferred or cancelled by the police force. Police forces are not required to resubmit data each time a crime record is transferred or cancelled; instead forces will deduct the crime from the cumulative quarterly returns that they supply to the Home Office.

This means that in some quarters a negative value may be presented. This system was designed to keep the figures accurate at a financial year level, and to reduce the burden on forces. Therefore, the data may not be completely accurate when looking at crimes committed in a specific quarter.

6. Offences involving firearms open data

Open data tables are provided for offences involving firearms. These data include any notifiable offence recorded by the police where a firearm has been fired, used as a blunt instrument or used as a threat. Firearm possession offences, where the firearm has not been used in the course of another offence, are not included.

The different types of firearms included in these data mirror those covered by the Firearms Act 1968 and the associated amendments to the Act. Offences involving air weapons are not included as these data are only published on an annual basis at a summary level.

Data is available from April 2008 and includes:

• force
• year and quarter
• weapon category
• offence group
• number of offences

7. Hate crime open data

Open data tables are provided for hate crime offences recorded by the police. Data are provided for the 43 police forces of England and Wales plus the British Transport Police.

Hate crime is defined as “any criminal offence which is perceived, by the victim or any other person, to be motivated by hostility or prejudice towards someone based on a personal characteristic.” This common definition was agreed in 2007 by the police, Crown Prosecution Service, Prison Service (now the National Offender Management Service) and other agencies that make up the criminal justice system. There are 5 centrally monitored strands of hate crime:

• race or ethnicity
• religion
• sexual orientation
• disability
• transgender identity

Hate crimes are a subset of notifiable crimes that are recorded by the police and make up around 3% of all crimes (based on police recorded crime figures for the year ending March 2023.

In the process of recording a crime, police can flag an offence as being motivated by one or more of the 5 monitored strands above (for example, an offence can be motivated by hostility towards the victim’s race and religion). Due to this, in the Hate Crime open data tables 2 worksheets are provided:

• by_motivating_factor
• by_total_offences

The By_motivating_factor worksheet contains numbers of hate crime offences by motivating factor and police forces for each year from 2011/12. As an offence can be motivated by more than one of the 5 monitored strands, it is not appropriate to sum these figures to get the total number of police recorded hate crimes. Around 5% of hate crime offences each year were estimated to have involved more than one motivating factor^{[footnote 1]}, the majority of these were hate crimes related to both race and religion.

The By_total_offences worksheet provides the total number of hate crimes by police force for the years 2011/12 onwards.

The Home Office carry out internal quality assurance of the hate crime collection before the annual publication. These checks include:

• a variation check of the data received from police forces – the total number of hate crimes along with the number of crimes recorded against each hate crime strand are compared with previous years’ figures to check for any vast deviations from the time series trend
• a check to ensure that the total number of hate crimes is higher than the total number of offences. Where these 2 figures were the same, the force was asked to confirm they were recording multiple hate crime strands
• comparing the number of race hate crimes with data from the racist incidents collection
• reconciling data with police forces; the data held on the Home Office database are returned to individual forces asking for confirmation that the data accords with that held on their own systems and orces resubmit data if required

Information on hate crime offences recorded by the police is published annually by the Home Office and can be found on the Hate Crime Statistics page. As well as overall hate crime offences, there are some offences in the main police recorded crime collection which have a specific racially or religiously motivated version. These are defined by statute and constitute a set of offences which are distinct from their non-racially or religiously aggravated equivalents. These racially or religiously aggravated offences are by definition hate crimes. Information on these offences can be found in Table A4 of the quarterly Crime Statistics in England and Wales series published by the Office for National Statistics or in the Police recorded crime open data tables published by the Home Office.

8. Rape Incidents and Crimes Open Data

The Home Office publishes a range of data on rape incidents and offences on an annual basis. These data present a summary of the total numbers of allegations of rape recorded by the police from 2016/17 onwards. Since April 2015, the Home Office Counting Rules have included a classification for ‘reported incidents of rape’. Police are expected to record all allegations of rape reported to them as soon as they are received under the reported incidents classification unless they are immediately recorded as a confirmed crime. Reported incidents of rape are then either confirmed as a crime and re-classified accordingly or are retained in the police data as an incident.

Some reported incidents will be determined to have been committed in another Police Force Area. Those reports will be transferred to the appropriate force and further recorded there – either as a confirmed crime or as a new reported incident of rape. The initial incident will be retained by the original force. All reports that amount to a report of rape (or appear to do so) should be recorded in this way irrespective of the source of that report.

Combining the numbers of recorded crimes of rape, cancelled crimes of rape and reported incidents of rape provides a summary of the totality of reports and allegations received.

The data includes:

• number of rape offences recorded by the police
• transferred rape offences - crime was committed outside the jurisdiction of the Police Force Area in which it was recorded – passed to the appropriate force
• cancelled rape offences
• number of incidents recorded by the police (excluding those recorded as crimes, including non-rape offences)

The incident data is also published by type of incident recorded:

• victim or third party not confirmed / cannot be traced
• credible evidence to the contrary exists
• transferred rape incidents - crime was committed outside the jurisdiction of the Police Force Area in which it was recorded – passed to the appropriate force

9. Supplementary outcomes metrics

Crime and crime outcomes data are also published alongside justice outcomes data from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) in the Criminal Justice System Delivery Data Dashboard.

The supplementary outcomes includes the metrics on the timeliness of crime outcomes which will subsequently feature in the CJS Scorecard. For all police forces, data is correct at the time of extraction and is subject to future revisions.

Column	Description
offence_type	Whether the record refers to all offences or recorded adult rape offences. (Any mention of adult rape offences within CPS data is referring to case which have a rape flag applied but not a child abuse flag).
stage	The stage of the Criminal Justice System that the metric falls under.
metric_number	The metric number.
metric_name	The metric name.
annual_or_quarterly	Whether the time_period column refers to a rolling annual period or a quarter.
time_period	The time period to which the record refers.
value	The value of the metric for the given geographic area and time period. The value is shown with no rounding applied.
reason_for_missing_data	The reason if the value column is empty. This could be due to 3 reasons: ‘Suppressed due to low volumes, ‘No data to calculate this field’ and ‘Data not available’.

10. Contact Details

These tables are designed to have many uses. The Home Office would like to hear from any users who have developed applications for these data tables and any suggestions for future releases.

For further information about crime outcomes statistics, please email: [email protected] or write to:

Crime and Policing Statistics
5th Floor Fry Building
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF

Home Office Responsible Statistician: John Flatley, Programme Director for Crime Statistics. Contact via [email protected]

1. Estimated from 24 Home Office Data Hub forces who supplied suitable data to the Home Office. See Annex B in Hate Crime, England and Wales, 2015/16 for more information on the Data Hub. ↩