Revision - New criminal offences statistics in England and Wales June 2009 - May 2013
Revision of the 2013 annual update of statistics on counting new criminal offences created by government departments in England and Wales.
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Details
The report is released by the Ministry of Justice and produced in accordance with the UK Statistics Authority code of conduct.
Revision: New Criminal Offences, England and Wales - 1st June 2009 to 31st May 2013
Introduction
The New Criminal Offences in England and Wales bulletin has been revised following its initial publication and withdrawal in December 2013.
This new publication includes a revised estimate, using improved methodology, on the number of offences contained within repealed or revoked sections of legislation in England and Wales between 1st June 2009 and 31st May 2013. The list produced does not indicate whether the offences have been remade in new legislation or if they have been removed from the statute book.
As before, the bulletin also covers activity of government departments in creating new criminal offences in England and Wales during the period June 2009 to May 2013. Comparison between this and the estimate of offences contained within repealed sections of legislation should not be made because they are calculated on a different basis. This publication provides users with information concerning the activity of government departments in creating new criminal offences in England and Wales during the period 1st June 2010 to 31st May 2013.
Main findings
In the 12 months ending May 2013, new criminal offences were contained in 60 pieces of legislation; this compares to 52 legislative provisions in the 12 months to May 2012.
From the 60 pieces of legislation, 327 new criminal offences were created. This represents a 12% increase in the number of new offences created compared with the preceding 12 months (292), but is 54% lower than the number created in the 12 months ending May 2010 (712).
According to estimates based on data extracted from the PNLD and verified using a library of legal information, in England and Wales in the 12 months ending May 2013, 15 separate pieces of legislation contained repealed or revoked sections, which also contained offences.
The repealed or revoked legislation contained 140 offences. This compares to 309 offences estimated to have been repealed in the original publication, before improvements in the methodology were implemented.
The bulletin is produced and handled by the ministry’s analytical professionals and production staff. Pre-release access of up to 24 hours is granted to the following persons in the Ministry of Justice:
Secretary of State for Justice; Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Criminal Justice; Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice Strategy; Permanent Secretary; Special Advisers; Director General, Corporate Performance Group; Director General, Criminal Justice Group; Director for Research & Analysis; Director for Criminal Law, Sentencing and Youth Policy; Director for Criminal Law and Legal Policy; Head of News; Senior Press Officer.