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Firearms: Greater London

Answer

Firearms are taken to be involved in an incident if they are fired, used as a blunt instrument against a person or used as a threat. The number of offences recorded by the City of London and Metropolitan police in which firearms (excluding air weapons) were reported to have been used between 1997-98 and 2005-06 is given in the tables. Data cannot be broken down by London borough.

Table 1: Crimes recorded in which firearms (excluding air weapons) were reported to have been used: City of London and Metropolitan police forces, 1997-98 to 2001-02
	Number of firearm offences
1997-98	1,951
1998-99¹	2,034
1999-2000	2,945
2000-01	3,036
2001 -02²	4,197
¹ There was a change in the counting rules for recorded crime on 1 April 1998.
² Figures for some crime categories may have been inflated by some police forces implementing the principles of the National Crime Recording Standard before 1 April 2002.

Table 2: Crimes recorded in which firearms (excluding air weapons) were reported to have been used: City of London and Metropolitan police forces, 2002-03 to 2005-06³,4
	Number of firearm offences
2002-03	4,202
2003-04	3,891
2004-05	3,697
2005-06	3,884
³ Data in this table take account of the introduction of the National Crime Recording Standard in April 2002, which may have resulted in inflated figures for some crime categories. These figures are not directly comparable with those for earlier years.
4 Data for 2006-07 will be available in January 2008.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

463 c1508W; 150892

Session

2006-07

Subjects

Firearms Greater London

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk