PCC Olly Martins: Burglary statistics are too simplistic

Last week independent charity Victim Support released figures for the amount of burglaries committed across England and Wales from January 2008 to December 2013.

During that time there were 20,822 burglaries recorded across the county – though offenders were caught in just 5,472 of those incidents (26.2%).

The stats, which were obtained through a Freedom of Information request, also revealed that 20% of the burglars caught were under the age of 18.

However the figures have been challenged by Mr Martins, who claims that they are too simplistic.

He said: “There is a small number of offenders who commit most burglaries, and they are usually very well known to the police and the rest of the criminal justice system.

“This means that the challenge for the force is not catching burglars but matching them to all the offences they have committed.

“In other words, for it to be true that Bedfordshire Police only catches 26% of burglars it would have to be the case that each burglary was committed by a different individual offender.”

Mr Martins added that the force is the “11th most effective force in terms of detections”.

He said: “This is a considerable achievement and something which I feel should be applauded – but even one burglary is one too many for the victim, and I believe that the early introduction of compulsory GPS tagging for prolific burglars can help to reduce these callous and often devastating offences.”