Saying that everything is fine when it plainly isn’t, even if we start with an objective look at rates of crime, merely fuels the idea that our political and media elite is completely out-of-touch
The thousands of girls abused, raped and trafficked over the past two or more decades may be unpersuaded by Fraser Nelson's Panglossian agenda. Indeed, I can't find if he has even noticed one of the biggest scandals of modern times as the entire establishments, local and national, turned a blind eye.
The crime data source you linked didn't include rape, sexual assault and other sexual offences. Yes, it's perfectly valid to make the point that rape and sexual assault reporting and recording measures have improved, and this might skew the data somewhat, but there has been a massive rise in rape and sexual assaults in this country, beginning to rise the mid-2010s. https://www.statista.com/statistics/315500/sexual-offences-england-wales/
Other data sources such as the ONS and the Home Office confirm the Statista figures.
The change in the country might be somewhat influenced by sources like GB News, new media, and X, but any effect is an imprimatur effect, in many ways a preference cascade as people finally feel less afraid about expressing unfashionable views.
And other sources of data like Migration Central on Substack are quite clear- Andrew Tate might have had a minor influence, but the main portion of the rise has been an increase in foreign nationals. This shouldn't surprise us, several countries in Europe have begun to disaggregate their crime data by national origin, showing a disturbingly familiar pattern in particular areas like rape and sexual assault.
A principled defence might be to say that despite the higher ratios for some national origins, rapes and sexual assaults remain rare per population. It might include the admonition that blaming any group for the criminal tendencies of small minority is unfair. But don't pretend the problem doesn't exist. Baroness Casey warned people that attempting to hide the problem from the public served no constructive purpose, least of all the interests of minority groups in the UK. Ingroup preference doesn't always result in outgroup hostility, but one thing the social psychology literature is adamant open is that preferential treatment is almost guaranteed to cause it.
Trying to protect groups by failing to acknowledge unpleasant truths about a small minority in their midst, is all but guaranteed to stir hatred and animosity against them.
Source: Tajfel, H., & Turner, J. C. (1979). "An integrative theory of intergroup conflict." In W. G. Austin & S. Worchel (Eds.), The Social Psychology of Intergroup Relations (pp. 33–47). Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole.Excerpt (pp. 38–39):
"The basic hypothesis of social identity theory is that pressures to evaluate one’s own group positively through ingroup/outgroup comparisons lead social groups to differentiate themselves from each other. However, this differentiation does not inevitably result in intergroup conflict or hostility. Conflict arises when the social identity of the ingroup is threatened, particularly through perceived inequities in resource allocation or status. For example, when an outgroup is seen to receive preferential treatment—whether in terms of material resources, social privileges, or institutional support—this can lead to a sense of relative deprivation among ingroup members. Such perceptions of unfair advantage can provoke hostility or discriminatory behavior, as the ingroup seeks to restore its positive distinctiveness or protect its status."
I should also mention that I generally love your work, but this is something we happen to disagree upon.
It fuels the idea that the political and media elite are out of touch because it's clearly true. Not only that but they don't give a damn about ordinary people and would prefer it if we service their life invisibly, without making any fuss. Much like some landed gentry had tunnels so they never had to see a servant crossing their lawn.
As someone who lives in one of those places that used to be ok, now very much isn't, Fraser Nelson's comments made me incandescent with rage.
The anti social behaviour and blatant crime have worn us down. Every day there is something and no that is not an exaggeration. Our local authority have had to beg Yvette for more help with policing due to a rise in crime and an unprecedented number of murders. I believe they have been granted some extra help, I doubt that would have happened if our crime was just in the imagination of plebs like me.
Our council tried the same trick, gaslighting the public. Saying our city centre was fine and it was just a misconception after a survey found many people did not feel safe there. They stopped that after a man was stabbed to death in a high street bank and there was a day time smash and grab raid on a shop by balaclava wearing men.
Part of my husband's job is in retail, retail is blighted by crime and threats of violence and actual violence. From open drug dealing to our lovely neighbours with a small child having to flee due to direct open threats of murder, fly tipping near my home more than once a week, burglary and theft and most definitely as you mentioned appalling driving, I'm not even sure many have passed their test, balaclava wearing black clad scooter and illegal e-bike riders, helmetless youth so blatant they ride, probably stolen, motorbikes down main roads in the day as well as in parks and on footpaths and across a nature reserve, add also illegal number plates and cars stinking of marijuana. Lime bike withdrew from here after a second attempt due to unprecedented levels of vandalism. There is so much more, including small local shops having to endure things like someone defecating on their doorstep, daily vomit and aggressive beggars. We are desperately trying to move. Any politicians that agree or even hint of agreeing with Nelson will never get my vote.
I never thought it would be Fraser Nelson that would put me into revolutionary rage.
Fraser Nelson and I apparently are living in different UKs. There is a gap between the actual crime rate, and crime that gets reported. For some time now, people haven’t bothered to report crime except for insurance purposes, because the police aren’t interested unless it’s a non-crime hate incident or motoring offence.
We have cut greenhouse gas emissions, but how is this brilliant? First it’s all a hoax, but the reality is we have cut emissions by shutting down manufacturing and buying from China, so greenhouse gas emissions have not been cut overall, we just transferred them to China.
Fraser thinks we gave a duty to turn Britain into the World’s poor house and refugee centre, and multi-culti, diversely-wersity is brilliant.
This is not the best time to be in Britain. High taxation, most of which to pay debt (£2.8 trillion) interest rather than deliver the already poor public services, (June Govt borrowing £20 billion of which £16 billion will service the debt interest), high inflation, overpaid public sector workers striking for more, young people can’t afford property, free speech a distant memory, energy bills skyrocketing while £billions flung at ludicrous “green” projects because the minister in charge is a maniac, then the destruction of economic activity.
I am old enough to have lived through near identical conditions in the 1970s, which anybody who did, will tell you it was not brilliant. This certainly is not the best of times - and the prospects it will get better any time soon are slim.
First up, burglary was almost entirely solved by China. People used to steal and fence things like VCRs and DVD players and they became very cheap and not worth fencing.
"What’s missing is any sense of social discipline"
Which leads to what we might call "personal hardening". You can say that crime has fallen, but you can also see that this is not because we have improved social discipline or the government (at whatever level) creating a deterrent, but because individuals and businesses have taken certain actions to avoid it. So...
Yes, shops locking up the booze in certain areas. The staff can get a look at the person before opening the cabinet. Did they see them nicking stuff before?
The high use of cars by women. There is a convenience aspect of cars but it's also the case that the car acts as a protective bubble which a bus or train doesn't give you. Even I know that part of my car vs train decision making is a) will my reserve seat be respected (because there is no enforcement of it) and b) is someone going to be playing techno.
The divide of the country into Bradford/Cullingworth places. The hardening here is to get to a nice place full of people with jobs and reputations who aren't going to commit crime, and will stop their children committing crime, and which is more than a walk away from the criminal types. You don't see graffiti in Marlborough because a kid will get told by his dad to clean it up.
The last of these, I believe has an effect on housing. People in the leafy parts of towns or nice market towns don't want a whole lot of scumbags moving in and ruining the place. I think it might well be why Japan doesn't have a housing problem. Because Japan has a high level of social discipline. Graffiti is not just one of those things, and doesn't have the warped fetishism of calling it "street art". You don't go straight to jail for nicking bikes if you're caught, but you don't get many chances to learn your lesson. It stops people doing it and just paying fines when caught as a cost of doing business. It also has no impact on the prison population.
Now what I believe is partly that you need a shift in culture at a national level, which may well start to happen with Reform, but I also think that localism is important here. Local authorities collecting rates that they get to spend and largely, being in charge of the police would change the incentives. They would want towns and cities to be safer, cleaner. Because if they weren't, people would leave and income would fall. Towns don't really care that much if there's broken glass at the playground if they just get a flat grant. They used to. Which is why parks had a little park keeper's house with an ex-military man who you didn't want to mess with. We now have parks turned to crap, and at some point, it all gets redone, and rapidly turns to crap again. You'd think Cambridge would care about graffiti on a famous bridge, the effect of that on the tourist experience, the loss of visitors and the impact on local tourist businesses, wouldn't you? Alton Towers is immaculate because it has incentives to be immaculate.
There IS two tier justice in this country. The migrant issue has simply dragged it out into the open. Bad actors are taking advantage, as they are programmed to do. The environment is changing. Our cities are becoming less white. Crime rates attributable to non British groups are staggering. People notice this. How could they not? Living in a country where a country mouse cannot venture safely into their local city, is not a country. It is a collection of ghettos. Some more well heeled than others, but ghettos nevertheless.
There is a very challenging issue—and it’s not universally the case, I freely admit that—when people’s personal, anecdotal experiences lead them to believe that more generalised circumstances prevail, in which conclusion they are simply wrong. I understand there are no votes in telling the electorate its perception is mistaken; I think this was a problem first Joe Biden then Kamala Harris faced last year in relation to the US economy. But what is the best course of action? (Not a rhetorical question, I genuinely don’t know.)
It is quite possible for overall crime to fall while high visibility crimes increase. Outside HMOs and student accommodation there's pretty much zero domestic burglary these days. But there's no doubt shoplifting has increased substantially since the end of the pandemic.
I agree shoplifting is more prevalent and it’s not helped by many police forces more or less disengaging from it. But there’s the more general abstract point: sometimes people are simply wrong about what’s happening. How do we address that? (An example off the top of my head would be the astounding, factor-of-thousands overestimate people regularly make of how much in terms of overall public expenditure how much we spend on MPs’ expenses etc.)
It's not my perception that's mistaken, it's evidenced by hard facts including local crime statistics, living in one place for over 25 years and actual regular experience of crime and antisocial behaviour. To be gaslit like this is outrageous. It certainly outlines there's no intention of dealing with crime in areas like mine Anyone who implies it's the problem of plebs with an over active imagination can go to hell.
Shops very deliberately made their environments as friction free as possible in order to cut costs. Doing this created very criminogenic spaces and yet shop owners expect the police and taxpayers to pay for their cost cutting exercise gone wrong? No thanks, re-design and re-fit your own shops, at your own cost.
Crime is still crime. And public authorities have a duty to respond to crime. Attacking shop workers to steal things isn't just because of some made up word line "crimogenic", criminals have agency.
Sorry for that but it was too much like "obesogenic" and I got triggered! Retail margins are tiny and the business is very competitive so the drive to reduce costs made sense. Still the Co-op director consistently says the problem isn't opportunistic theft but organised criminal gangs. Suspect it is a bit of both.
The thousands of girls abused, raped and trafficked over the past two or more decades may be unpersuaded by Fraser Nelson's Panglossian agenda. Indeed, I can't find if he has even noticed one of the biggest scandals of modern times as the entire establishments, local and national, turned a blind eye.
The crime data source you linked didn't include rape, sexual assault and other sexual offences. Yes, it's perfectly valid to make the point that rape and sexual assault reporting and recording measures have improved, and this might skew the data somewhat, but there has been a massive rise in rape and sexual assaults in this country, beginning to rise the mid-2010s. https://www.statista.com/statistics/315500/sexual-offences-england-wales/
Other data sources such as the ONS and the Home Office confirm the Statista figures.
The change in the country might be somewhat influenced by sources like GB News, new media, and X, but any effect is an imprimatur effect, in many ways a preference cascade as people finally feel less afraid about expressing unfashionable views.
And other sources of data like Migration Central on Substack are quite clear- Andrew Tate might have had a minor influence, but the main portion of the rise has been an increase in foreign nationals. This shouldn't surprise us, several countries in Europe have begun to disaggregate their crime data by national origin, showing a disturbingly familiar pattern in particular areas like rape and sexual assault.
A principled defence might be to say that despite the higher ratios for some national origins, rapes and sexual assaults remain rare per population. It might include the admonition that blaming any group for the criminal tendencies of small minority is unfair. But don't pretend the problem doesn't exist. Baroness Casey warned people that attempting to hide the problem from the public served no constructive purpose, least of all the interests of minority groups in the UK. Ingroup preference doesn't always result in outgroup hostility, but one thing the social psychology literature is adamant open is that preferential treatment is almost guaranteed to cause it.
Trying to protect groups by failing to acknowledge unpleasant truths about a small minority in their midst, is all but guaranteed to stir hatred and animosity against them.
Source: Tajfel, H., & Turner, J. C. (1979). "An integrative theory of intergroup conflict." In W. G. Austin & S. Worchel (Eds.), The Social Psychology of Intergroup Relations (pp. 33–47). Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole.Excerpt (pp. 38–39):
"The basic hypothesis of social identity theory is that pressures to evaluate one’s own group positively through ingroup/outgroup comparisons lead social groups to differentiate themselves from each other. However, this differentiation does not inevitably result in intergroup conflict or hostility. Conflict arises when the social identity of the ingroup is threatened, particularly through perceived inequities in resource allocation or status. For example, when an outgroup is seen to receive preferential treatment—whether in terms of material resources, social privileges, or institutional support—this can lead to a sense of relative deprivation among ingroup members. Such perceptions of unfair advantage can provoke hostility or discriminatory behavior, as the ingroup seeks to restore its positive distinctiveness or protect its status."
I should also mention that I generally love your work, but this is something we happen to disagree upon.
It fuels the idea that the political and media elite are out of touch because it's clearly true. Not only that but they don't give a damn about ordinary people and would prefer it if we service their life invisibly, without making any fuss. Much like some landed gentry had tunnels so they never had to see a servant crossing their lawn.
As someone who lives in one of those places that used to be ok, now very much isn't, Fraser Nelson's comments made me incandescent with rage.
The anti social behaviour and blatant crime have worn us down. Every day there is something and no that is not an exaggeration. Our local authority have had to beg Yvette for more help with policing due to a rise in crime and an unprecedented number of murders. I believe they have been granted some extra help, I doubt that would have happened if our crime was just in the imagination of plebs like me.
Our council tried the same trick, gaslighting the public. Saying our city centre was fine and it was just a misconception after a survey found many people did not feel safe there. They stopped that after a man was stabbed to death in a high street bank and there was a day time smash and grab raid on a shop by balaclava wearing men.
Part of my husband's job is in retail, retail is blighted by crime and threats of violence and actual violence. From open drug dealing to our lovely neighbours with a small child having to flee due to direct open threats of murder, fly tipping near my home more than once a week, burglary and theft and most definitely as you mentioned appalling driving, I'm not even sure many have passed their test, balaclava wearing black clad scooter and illegal e-bike riders, helmetless youth so blatant they ride, probably stolen, motorbikes down main roads in the day as well as in parks and on footpaths and across a nature reserve, add also illegal number plates and cars stinking of marijuana. Lime bike withdrew from here after a second attempt due to unprecedented levels of vandalism. There is so much more, including small local shops having to endure things like someone defecating on their doorstep, daily vomit and aggressive beggars. We are desperately trying to move. Any politicians that agree or even hint of agreeing with Nelson will never get my vote.
I never thought it would be Fraser Nelson that would put me into revolutionary rage.
Fraser Nelson and I apparently are living in different UKs. There is a gap between the actual crime rate, and crime that gets reported. For some time now, people haven’t bothered to report crime except for insurance purposes, because the police aren’t interested unless it’s a non-crime hate incident or motoring offence.
We have cut greenhouse gas emissions, but how is this brilliant? First it’s all a hoax, but the reality is we have cut emissions by shutting down manufacturing and buying from China, so greenhouse gas emissions have not been cut overall, we just transferred them to China.
Fraser thinks we gave a duty to turn Britain into the World’s poor house and refugee centre, and multi-culti, diversely-wersity is brilliant.
This is not the best time to be in Britain. High taxation, most of which to pay debt (£2.8 trillion) interest rather than deliver the already poor public services, (June Govt borrowing £20 billion of which £16 billion will service the debt interest), high inflation, overpaid public sector workers striking for more, young people can’t afford property, free speech a distant memory, energy bills skyrocketing while £billions flung at ludicrous “green” projects because the minister in charge is a maniac, then the destruction of economic activity.
I am old enough to have lived through near identical conditions in the 1970s, which anybody who did, will tell you it was not brilliant. This certainly is not the best of times - and the prospects it will get better any time soon are slim.
First up, burglary was almost entirely solved by China. People used to steal and fence things like VCRs and DVD players and they became very cheap and not worth fencing.
"What’s missing is any sense of social discipline"
Which leads to what we might call "personal hardening". You can say that crime has fallen, but you can also see that this is not because we have improved social discipline or the government (at whatever level) creating a deterrent, but because individuals and businesses have taken certain actions to avoid it. So...
Yes, shops locking up the booze in certain areas. The staff can get a look at the person before opening the cabinet. Did they see them nicking stuff before?
The high use of cars by women. There is a convenience aspect of cars but it's also the case that the car acts as a protective bubble which a bus or train doesn't give you. Even I know that part of my car vs train decision making is a) will my reserve seat be respected (because there is no enforcement of it) and b) is someone going to be playing techno.
The divide of the country into Bradford/Cullingworth places. The hardening here is to get to a nice place full of people with jobs and reputations who aren't going to commit crime, and will stop their children committing crime, and which is more than a walk away from the criminal types. You don't see graffiti in Marlborough because a kid will get told by his dad to clean it up.
The last of these, I believe has an effect on housing. People in the leafy parts of towns or nice market towns don't want a whole lot of scumbags moving in and ruining the place. I think it might well be why Japan doesn't have a housing problem. Because Japan has a high level of social discipline. Graffiti is not just one of those things, and doesn't have the warped fetishism of calling it "street art". You don't go straight to jail for nicking bikes if you're caught, but you don't get many chances to learn your lesson. It stops people doing it and just paying fines when caught as a cost of doing business. It also has no impact on the prison population.
Now what I believe is partly that you need a shift in culture at a national level, which may well start to happen with Reform, but I also think that localism is important here. Local authorities collecting rates that they get to spend and largely, being in charge of the police would change the incentives. They would want towns and cities to be safer, cleaner. Because if they weren't, people would leave and income would fall. Towns don't really care that much if there's broken glass at the playground if they just get a flat grant. They used to. Which is why parks had a little park keeper's house with an ex-military man who you didn't want to mess with. We now have parks turned to crap, and at some point, it all gets redone, and rapidly turns to crap again. You'd think Cambridge would care about graffiti on a famous bridge, the effect of that on the tourist experience, the loss of visitors and the impact on local tourist businesses, wouldn't you? Alton Towers is immaculate because it has incentives to be immaculate.
There IS two tier justice in this country. The migrant issue has simply dragged it out into the open. Bad actors are taking advantage, as they are programmed to do. The environment is changing. Our cities are becoming less white. Crime rates attributable to non British groups are staggering. People notice this. How could they not? Living in a country where a country mouse cannot venture safely into their local city, is not a country. It is a collection of ghettos. Some more well heeled than others, but ghettos nevertheless.
There is a very challenging issue—and it’s not universally the case, I freely admit that—when people’s personal, anecdotal experiences lead them to believe that more generalised circumstances prevail, in which conclusion they are simply wrong. I understand there are no votes in telling the electorate its perception is mistaken; I think this was a problem first Joe Biden then Kamala Harris faced last year in relation to the US economy. But what is the best course of action? (Not a rhetorical question, I genuinely don’t know.)
It is quite possible for overall crime to fall while high visibility crimes increase. Outside HMOs and student accommodation there's pretty much zero domestic burglary these days. But there's no doubt shoplifting has increased substantially since the end of the pandemic.
I agree shoplifting is more prevalent and it’s not helped by many police forces more or less disengaging from it. But there’s the more general abstract point: sometimes people are simply wrong about what’s happening. How do we address that? (An example off the top of my head would be the astounding, factor-of-thousands overestimate people regularly make of how much in terms of overall public expenditure how much we spend on MPs’ expenses etc.)
It's not my perception that's mistaken, it's evidenced by hard facts including local crime statistics, living in one place for over 25 years and actual regular experience of crime and antisocial behaviour. To be gaslit like this is outrageous. It certainly outlines there's no intention of dealing with crime in areas like mine Anyone who implies it's the problem of plebs with an over active imagination can go to hell.
Shops very deliberately made their environments as friction free as possible in order to cut costs. Doing this created very criminogenic spaces and yet shop owners expect the police and taxpayers to pay for their cost cutting exercise gone wrong? No thanks, re-design and re-fit your own shops, at your own cost.
Crime is still crime. And public authorities have a duty to respond to crime. Attacking shop workers to steal things isn't just because of some made up word line "crimogenic", criminals have agency.
Sure. But shops invited this on themselves in an effort to save costs. It was an untested assumption that this wouldn't invite more crime.
"Made up words" is a bit beneath you, having read this blog for years.
Sorry for that but it was too much like "obesogenic" and I got triggered! Retail margins are tiny and the business is very competitive so the drive to reduce costs made sense. Still the Co-op director consistently says the problem isn't opportunistic theft but organised criminal gangs. Suspect it is a bit of both.
Please don't get into that 'far right' thing?