Energy and Environment Minister Josh Frydenberg said he thought that Victorians have never felt more unsafe, and that burglaries, assaults and murders are rising year-on-year. Is he right?
Crime is not at all evenly distributed in any country or city, so smaller scale data is essential.
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South Africa releases crime statistics once a year. Politicians interpret them according to their particular agendas. Here's a guide to what to look for and how to make sense of the trends.
A man walks through a field of crosses erected near Pretoria, South Africa, to honour mostly white farmers who have died in.
farm attacks.
Reuters/Juda Ngwenya
The widely-held assumption that murder rates have been increasing in South Africa in the past two decades is incorrect – and it may divert attention from a new problem that needs attention.
Panellists discussed domestic violence on Q&A on February 1, 2016.
Q&A
Police brutality is an ongoing problem in South Africa. Police-worn body cameras may help reduce such incidents by improving accountability. They may also contribute to the safety of officers.
Uber is popular. But is it ‘no safer than hitchhiking’?
AAP/Joel Carrett
Tim Newburn, London School of Economics and Political Science
Labour and the Lib Dems have clashed over whether crime is going up or down. Which is it?
Long Bay Correctional Centre was dubbed the ‘Long Bay Hilton’ by ‘tough on crime’ advocates whose campaigns helped fill prison cells to overflowing.
Wikimedia Commons/J Bar
Most crime in NSW has been declining since the early 2000s, and the state's current murder rate is half what it was in 1988. So why is the NSW prison population growing?
In recent times, Victoria has reverted to the punitive approach that once filled the Old Melbourne Gaol, with little thought for the long-term consequences.
Flickr/Eva
Victoria was once characterised by low imprisonment rates and innovative corrections policy. The state now has Australia's highest rate of growth in imprisonment.
Public pressure to be ‘tough’ on crime can lead governments to neglect some of our deadliest problems, such as family violence.
Paul Miller/AAP
Queensland has a new Labor minority government, led by Annastacia Palaszczuk, after the shock defeat of the Liberal National Party. Labor’s pre-election promises were “modest”, leaving many now wondering…
A spate of shootings and public brawls prompted a Queensland government crackdown on bikie gangs – but there is much more to the state’s falling crime rates than just getting bikies off the streets.
AAP Image/Dan Peled
Queensland’s Liberal National government has made law and order – particularly its anti-bikie laws – a key part of its re-election pitch. The government recently claimed that “Criminal Gang laws (are…
Still shady after all these years.
Brian A Jackson
A report from Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary has revealed that police in England and Wales fail to record in excess of 800,000 crimes a year. That’s one in five offences; over one-quarter of…
Smash-and-grab: statistics only give us a fractured picture of crime.
raleighwoman
Tim Newburn, London School of Economics and Political Science
The Office for National Statistics released the latest crime statistics last week, and the headline findings are really rather remarkable. Although approximately 8 million offences were recorded by the…
