Crime Levels.

Wednesday, 5 April 2006

Questions (233)

John Deasy

Question:

243 Mr. Deasy asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the number of crimes recorded and detected across all headings in Waterford-Kilkenny Garda division during 1997, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13734/06]

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Written answers

Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. McDowell)

I am informed by the Garda authorities that the following table provides the total number of headline offences, by group, recorded and detected in the Garda division of Waterford-Kilkenny for the years 2000-05, inclusive.

The introduction of the PULSE computer system by the Garda Síochána in 1999 has led to more complete and comprehensive recording of crimes reported than was previously the case. Consequently, the statistics provided for 1997 are not comparable with statistics provided for 2000 and subsequent years.

The figures provided for 2000 and 2001 are incomplete due to the phased implementation of PULSE. The first full year captured is 2002 and is a more accurate base year to use.

Any interpretation of the crime figures should factor in the increase in our population in the past ten years. In 1995, with a population of almost 3.6 million people, there were 29 crimes per 1,000 of the population. In 2005, with a population of over 4.1 million, there were 24.6 crimes per 1,000 of the population, a reduction of 4.4 crimes per 1,000 of the population. To put this in context, during the two full years of the rainbow coalition Government, with a population of 600,000 fewer than at present, the headline crime figures were: 1995, 102,484; 1996, 100,785.

It should also be noted that the headline offence of homicide includes not only murder and manslaughter but the other homicide offences of infanticide, abortion, attempted murder and threat to murder. Over the six year period shown in the table there were 17 murders recorded with 17 detected, and two manslaughters recorded with two detected.

Headline Offences Recorded and Detected for the Garda Division of Waterford/Kilkenny for the years 2000 to 2005

	2005*	2004	2003	2002	2001	2000
	Rec	Det	Rec	Det	Rec	Det	Rec	Det	Rec	Det	Rec	Det
Homicide	10	9	3	3	3	2	6	6	3	3	3	3
Assault	201	151	227	181	239	205	285	247	176	136	105	93
Sexual Offences	105	64	74	46	137	109	134	110	172	160	54	50
Arson	80	24	36	6	48	24	67	28	57	21	41	27
Drugs	169	169	141	141	210	209	246	246	191	191	129	129
Theft	2,316	1,167	2,168	1,201	2,207	1,316	1,848	1,001	1,710	993	1,422	854
Burglary	1,236	240	1,013	217	1,192	307	1,096	298	1,058	368	1,181	440
Robbery	49	28	39	22	65	36	54	28	67	38	63	47
Fraud	142	96	273	252	300	268	222	188	261	243	203	192
Other	44	35	57	44	90	87	57	48	34	33	10	10
Total	4,352	1,983	4,031	2,113	4,491	2,563	4,015	2,200	3,729	2,186	3,211	1,845

* Figures provided are provisional, operational and liable to change.