Grayling slammed by IDS: ‘profoundly misleading’


by Sunny Hundal    
4:48 pm - February 3rd 2010

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Another day another Tory policy badly fluffed up.

Today it was Chris Grayling who was taken apart for badly distorting crime stats in order to popularise the Tory ‘Broken Society’ narrative.

Grayling claimed there had been a “968% increase in serious violent crime”. The claim was made in an email to the BBC’s Mark Easton.

But they compare statistic before 2002 to those after, despite a big change in measurement.

And did New Labour do that to massage figures in their favour? In fact, the opposite.

The Home Office had been accused of under-estimating violence for years because the decision as to whether an incident was a violent crime had been taken by police.
…
After 2002, though, officers were obliged to record all incidents as violent crimes if the alleged victim said that is what it was. The aim was to stop police fiddling the figures and to get a better picture of violence. The obvious result was to send the statistics shooting up.

So the figures increased thanks to a more honest approach, which Chris Grayling immediately used to further his own agenda.

Easton now reports that some of Chris Grayling’s own colleagues admit this was the wrong approach:

Now former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith has written to me to say he agrees that such comparisons are profoundly misleading.

To emphasise the point – a senior Tory now admits his colleague’s approach to crime stats was “profoundly misleading”.

Grayling was questioned about this on the Today programme this morning by Evan Davis.

ED: Did you know that the recoding method had changed when you sent these figures out?

CG: Well there is certainly change sin the recording method at the time but the point is that these are the figures .. they are the only comparators available, they are published by the Home Office, Mark is wrong when he says that the Conservatives have included certain items in the figures .. we’ve included nothing, we don’t create crime figures, we use the official crime figures published by the Home Office ..

ED: But the Home Office provide caveats and say these figures should not be used for comparison? Did you know that that is what they advised when you sent these figures out with comparisons to be made?

CG: Take the case of Milton Keynes for example, the one that Mark has just given, what actually the police officer in Milton Keynes said was look, there are all these things contained in the violent crime figures, these are the violent crime figures that are published now this year by the government ..

ED: But you have provided them to be compared with earlier crime statistics that were collected on a different basis and which the statisticians warn should not be compared. I’m just asking did you know that the statisticians said these should not be compared?

CG: I know there has been a change, I also know the Home Office has continued to use the same comparators. Now as an opposition party we don’t make the statistics, we can only use what the Home Office publishes. The Home Office itself continues to sue these comparators and so ..

ED: I actually have some example provided by you of where the Home Office does provide these comparisons but they provide the caveat?

CG: Well when these figures where reviewed in 2006 independently the independent assessors actually said very specifically that the changes that were made .. the comments made by the Home Office, the caveats they put in had been put in because they were the most likely to be politically advantageous to the government. They say so specifically. But look, Evan, the whole point of all of this .. we can dance around, you know ..

ED: No it is not about dancing around and picking little .. it is not being pedantic, you are inviting people to make a comparison of two sets of figures that are apples and oranges?

CG: They are not apples and oranges, these are the figures. When the government made another major change ..

What a shambles.

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About the author
Sunny Hundal is editor of LC. Also: on Twitter, at Pickled Politics and Guardian CIF.
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Reader comments


1. James Graham

“98% increase in serious violent crime” – 68% actually.

2. rparker

figures are manipulated down as police dont respond to help calls now a lot of people dont bother as for burglary for get it maipulation this is this governments middle name tell the truth for o nce inyour shameful lives this the part of aprehension not aspiration

3. Sevillista

@rparker

“figures are manipulated down as police dont respond to help calls now a lot of people dont bother as for burglary”

Where is your evidence that people are less likely to report burglary? Academic study please – ‘cos Cameron/the right-wing press/the guy in the pub said so doesn’t cut it.

And if you are concerned with the flaws of data on reported crime (as am I – a lot of factors affect reported crime other than the actual crime rate, including
police attitudes, dictate on the categorisation of crime, likelihood of prosecution, insurance company procedures etc), why not look at a measure not susceptible to such fiddling and changes in people’s behaviour – British Crime Survey.

I’m sure that this will confirm your instincts won’t it – the BCS is sure to show a dramatic rise in crime post-1997 as Blair and Brown broke Britain through their crazy, evil and perverse socialistic ways.

Can anyone help rparker out by showing me what the BCS says? Like I said – I’m sure he is right. The Conservative and the Mail wouldn’t be bullshitting about rises in crime would they now?


Reactions: Twitter, blogs
  1. House Of Twits

    RT @pickledpolitics Bizarre no one's noticed this: 'Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by Iain Duncan Smith! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  2. MusicMP

    RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  3. Joseph Brown

    RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  4. sunny hundal

    @tom_watson and another one today: http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  5. alastair harding

    RT @BevaniteEllie: Even IDS is condemning Chris -Broken Britain- Grayling's stat manipulation. Gd work from @libcon http://tinyurl.com/yhqf4ku

  6. Bryony Victoria King

    RT @BevaniteEllie: Even IDS is condemning Chris -Broken Britain- Grayling's stat manipulation. Gd work from @libcon http://tinyurl.com/yhqf4ku

  7. lornaspenceley

    Chris Grayling makes another complete cods of a Tory press offensive http://tinyurl.com/yhqf4ku Is 'Grayling' cockney rhyming slang perhaps?

  8. Matthew Dear

    RT @BevaniteEllie: RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  9. Liberal Conspiracy

    Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  10. Ellie Gellard

    RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  11. sunny hundal

    Bizarre no one's noticed this: 'Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by Iain Duncan Smith! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  12. Ben Cooper

    RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  13. Andrew Gwynne

    RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  14. Ben Cooper

    RT @pickledpolitics: Bizarre no one's noticed this: 'Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by Iain Duncan Smith! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  15. Chris Paul

    RT @pickledpolitics: Bizarre no one's noticed this: 'Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by Iain Duncan Smith! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  16. Stuart Pearce

    RT @pickledpolitics: Bizarre no one's noticed this: 'Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by Iain Duncan Smith! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  17. novocastrianrob

    RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  18. uberVU - social comments

    Social comments and analytics for this post…

    This post was mentioned on Twitter by libcon: Grayling slammed as “profoundly misleading” by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1…

  19. Jonathan Taylor

    RT @BenCooper86: RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  20. David Wright MP

    Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  21. Karen Hanna Kruzycka

    RT @libcon: Grayling slammed as "profoundly misleading" by IDS! http://bit.ly/cjeBe1

  22. Ellie Gellard

    Even IDS is condemning Chris -Broken Britain- Grayling's stat manipulation. Gd work from @libcon http://tinyurl.com/yhqf4ku

  23. Liberal Conspiracy » Stats authority publicly rebukes Chris Grayling; says he is “misleading”!

    [...]   February 4, 2010 at 2:40 pm We revealed yesterday how Tory home secretary Chris Grayling was using misleading data to conjure up visions of a “Broken Society” when the data flatly contradicted [...]

  24. Liberal Conspiracy » The Economist trashes Tory ‘broken Britain’ narrative

    [...] week shadow home secretary Chris Grayling was comprehensively debunked by BBC reporting when he said that crime had risen massively under New [...]

  25. Swedish Schools: Show me the market! « Left Outside

    [...] Schools: Show me the market! Its nice to see the Tories screw up (again), but it is distressing to see fail what may have been a promising avenue for reforming [...]

  26. Liberal Conspiracy » Desperate Tories go for immigration ‘dog-whistle’

    [...] doubt Chris Grayling will be trotted out next to say how much crime has risen under [...]

  27. sunny hundal

    @PolFromTheSL yes, and they actually made the stats more streamlined – http://bit.ly/cjeBe1





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