Written question asked by Hugh Bayley (Labour) on Thursday, 20 March 2008, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 26 March 2008. It was answered by Lord Coaker (Labour) on Monday, 21 April 2008 on behalf of the Home Office.

Crime: North Yorkshire

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what percentage of crime in North Yorkshire was cleared up in each year since 1987.

Answer

The requested information is given in the following tables.Offences which are 'cleared up' are referred to as detections.

Recorded crime statistics for North Yorkshire police force, 1987 to 2006-07
Table A: Detection rates for total crime in North Yorkshire police force—1987 to 1997
	Detection rate (%)
1987	34
1988	39
1989	35
1990	40
1991	36
1992	33
1993	30
1994	25
1995	23
1996	25
1997	26

Table B: Detection rates for total crime in North Yorkshire police force—1998-99 to 2001-02¹,²
	Detection rate (%)
1997-98	26
1998-99	33
1999-2000	31
2000-01	30
2001-02	26
¹ The offence coverage was extended and counting rules revised from 1998-99. This will have had an effect on the number of detections recorded. Figures from that date are not comparable with those for 1997.
² The data in this table is prior to the introduction of the National Crime Recording Standard (NCRS). These rates are not directly comparable with those for later years.

Table C: Detection rates for total crime in North Yorkshire police force—2002-03 to 2006-07¹,²
	Detection rate (%)
2002-03	26
2003-04	28
2004-05	35
2005-06	35
2006-07	33
¹ The data in this table takes account of the introduction of the National Crime Recording Standard (NCRS) in April 2002.
These rates are not directly comparable with those for earlier years.
² It should be noted that non-sanction detections that contribute to the percentage change in detection rates have fallen in recent years reflecting a significant shift by many police forces away from recording detections of crime where no further action is taken. For this reason overall detections rates over time are not fully comparable. From 1 April 2007 the rules governing recording of non-sanction detections were revised to reduce the scope within which they can be claimed to a very limited set of circumstances.

Secondary information