Force did not 'cheat' latest crime figures

DEVON and Cornwall Police say their new position as the ‘safest’ force area in the country has not been achieved by cheating the figures

- CARL EVE

It has been suggested the low crime statistics released by the Office of National Statistics (ONS) - which finally put Devon and Cornwall Police in the top position out of all the forces in England and Wales - was only due to the force failing to provide sufficient crime reports to the Home Office, which are then passed onto the ONS.

In May this year national newspapers reported how zero crimes had been recorded in the official 2022 statistics for the force “due to problems with the installation of a new IT system for recording offences”. It was noted that Devon and Cornwall Police had failed to submit a full set of stats due to the implementation of a new multi-million-pound operating system from Canadian firm Niche Technology.

The Niche Record Management Systems (RMS) is used by 26 other police forces in England and Wales, but only Devon and Cornwall failed to submit its full 2022 crime statistics to the ONS, it was claimed.

At the time a spokesman for Devon and Cornwall Police said: “Due to the implementation of our new operational system, Niche, we have not been able to provide the data for the last quarter of the 12-month period to the Home Office/ONS.