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Foreigners commit 20 per cent of crime in London, say police
Last updated at 15:22pm on 14.08.07
More than one in five crimes committed in London in the first six months of this year were carried out by a foreign citizen, new police figures have revealed.
During the period there were 22,793 crimes in the capital for which a foreign national has been charged.
More than a quarter were violent offences, ranging from murder to assault. There were also nearly 6,000 drug offences, 414 sex crimes, 522 robberies and almost 1,000 burglaries.
The highest number of offences were carried out by Poles, charged with 2,310 crimes between the start of January and the end of June.
Jamaicans, Irish nationals, Somalians and Romanians - accused of more than 1,000 crimes - had the next worst levels of offending.
The figures, released by the Met under the Freedom of Information Act, will fuel debate about the Government's immigration policy.
Ministers insist the large influx of foreign nationals has significant economic benefits, despite concerns about the pressure on services.
But shadow immigration minister Damien Green described today's figures as disturbing.
"This is a fairly shocking side effect of the lack of control of our borders and the sheer numbers of people coming to Britain," he said.
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The new statistics cover the number arrested and charged for "notifiable offences" - those which are more serious - and show a total of 106,678 crimes.
Of these, 82,459 were committed by Britons with a further 1,426 carried by people of "unknown" nationality, leaving foreign nationals responsible for the remaining offences.
Seven EU members - Poland, Ireland, Romania, Lithuania, France, Portugal and Italy, all of whose citizens are free to travel to Britain - feature in a list of the 20 nationalities responsible for the highest number of offences.
Among the Poles, 583 were charged with violent crimes, 32 with sex offences, 201 with burglary, 635 with theft or handling and 626 with drug offences.
Drug crime accounted for around half the Italian and French totals, while the Irish were responsible for the highest level of burglary with 403 recorded offences.
The main crime committed by Romanians, whose working rights in the UK are severely restricted, was theft or handling with 695 such offences.
Among non-EU citizens, Jamaicans have the highest level of offending with 1,750 crimes during the six month period covered by the figures.
Of these, 770 were drug offences, while there were also 425 violent crimes, 28 sex offences and 42 robberies by Jamaican passport holders.
The worst fraud total was recorded by Nigerians, with 275 crimes, while Somalian nationals were also among the most frequent offenders.
The Met's decision to begin recording the nationality of offenders follows a Home Office request made after the row last year over the Government's failure to consider more than 1,000 foreign national prisoners for deportation.
Armed robber: Andrew Lincoln
The sadists 'addicted to violence'
The problem of foreign nationals committing crimes in London was highlighted when three armed robbers - all from overseas - were jailed for life for a "sadistic" campaign of violence against commuters.
The three - Jamaican Robert Lincoln, 18, of Barking, Rwandan Sofian Majera, 22, of Dagenham, and Portuguese national Peter Frota, 19, used guns, knives and baseball bats to kidnap and rob motorists and pedestrians.
Their victims were stripped of valuables, beaten and threatened with further violence unless they handed over their pin numbers.
One victim had his arm stamped on until it broke and another was tortured with a cigarette lighter, while others were threatened with having their eyes gouged out or being burnt alive.
The judge said the three, who had 36 previous convictions between them, had been "addicted to violence" as he jailed them last November.
Frota's older brother Louis, 22, a one-time trialist for Dagenham and Redbridge FC, was also in court. He was jailed for four and a half years for lesser offences.
Reader views (23)
hmmm. let's make some simple calculation:
It's about 2,300 crimes commited by Poles from some 500,000 of Poles living in London. It's some 0.46 %.
Whilst 1.750 crimes commited by some of 100,000 Jamaicans (more than 1%), about 1% of Irish commited crimes.
And finally... about 17.000 crimes commited by Brits in London (let's say about 5,000,000) that's mean that 1,4% of British commited crimes in London - three times more than Poles!
- Nizki, Poland, 15/02/2010 01:50
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Surely these figures are meaningless if foreigners coming to or born in UK
are classed as British whether they hold a British passport or not. I would like to know the percentage if the figures included English instead of British.
- Laurence, Christchurch,Dorset, 19/09/2007 23:44
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Mary, you're right that I mistakenly confused foreign born and foreign national statistics. According to the Mayor's office, using the Annual Population Survey for 2004, 21 per cent of the city's population were foreign nationals, although the survey is know to undercount migrant groups, so the real figure is higher. So it seems foreign nationals are slightly less likely that the rest of the population to be represented in crime figures.
- Laurence, London, 17/08/2007 13:25
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No Laurence, because many of the of the one third of Londoners who were foreign born are long standing immigrants who are now British citizens! Any crimes committed by them were thus added to the "82,459 committed by Britons" and not the 22,793 committed by foreigners! As nobody has a clue how many Britons or foreigners are actually in London the staistics do not enlighten us on their relative criminality.
- Mary, England, 17/08/2007 00:17
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And things will only get worse if Labour are voted in again. They have to allow huge numbers of immigrants to enter Britain to keep their rich industrialist foreign backers happy. Stopping or even slowing down immigration would cost the labour party a fortune.
While there's a Labour government immigration will continue in huge numbers.
- Teresa Newland, London, 15/08/2007 13:05
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Shouldnt the real headline be 'Foreigners less likely to commit crime than the British' considering there are more than 20% foreigners of the total London population it makes perfect sense.
- Boleto, London, 15/08/2007 12:01
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20 per cent of crime might be committed by foreigners, but one third of London's population is foreign-born, so surely this means foreigners are in fact less likely to be committing crimes than the population as a whole. Put it another way, the two-thirds of the population of London who are British-born are committing 80 per cent of crime!
- Laurence, London, UK, 14/08/2007 22:56
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Since foreigners constitute 31% of the population of London and apparently only commit 20% of the crimes, the clear policy implication is that to reduce the crime rate, immigration should be greatly encouraged.
- Diana, Camden Town, London UK, 14/08/2007 21:05
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Of course, "20% of crime in London committed by foreigners" is much better anti-immigrant propaganda than "80% of crime in London committed by British Nationals"
- Dominic Mason, Rugby, UK, 14/08/2007 20:20
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Interesting that the "Violent" Americans, who make up one of the largest visitor groups to the U.K, don't even make the to 20.
- R M, London, UK, 14/08/2007 19:52
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They should really punish these criminals and send in the 16-year old Community Supporters!
- Jacqueline, Hampstead, London, 14/08/2007 19:43
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Has anybody checked how many crimes have been committed by Brits in places like Malaga, Benidorm, Ibiza, Falaraki, or the Canaries so far this year?
- Sarah, London, 14/08/2007 16:37
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So much for immigration being good for our country, remember that these figures will also show that immigrants asylum seekers etc who hold British passports will be classed as British and not the ethnic group they are in, so crime by immigrants will be much, much higher.
- Paul Mchale, London, England, 14/08/2007 16:05
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Isn't multiculturalism wonderful!
- Adam, Harrow, UK, 14/08/2007 15:15
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Nice to know that we English are still responsible for the other 80 percent though... which is a huge majority.
- Daveb, London, 14/08/2007 14:35
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In the 2001 Census, 1779300 (24.81%) of those living in London were foreign nationals. Therefore, if more than one in five crimes committed in London in the first six months of this year was carried out by a foreign citizen, we should welcome more of them as they seem to have a lower propensity to commit crime (or rather be caught) than the existing population! This is classic right-leaning and folk-devil reporting.
- A proud tax-paying, non thieving immigrant, Anon, 14/08/2007 14:08
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Please tell me that all of these offenders will be returned to their country of origin and any rights to stay here are revoked.
- Kay, London, 14/08/2007 13:31
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Presumably this is only for "solved" crimes. Could we feasibly not deport them back to their country of origin to be jailed? Surely this would ease the prison overcrowding that we are allegedly suffering at the moment and might mean that criminals are actually given sentences that reflect the seriousness of their crimes?
- Pa Roddy, London, 14/08/2007 13:01
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Yes, why commit crimes back home where the prisons are horrid and the police aren't nice and politically correct, when you can come here? Our police have their hands tied behind their backs with red tape, the system will bail them out so they can do a runner, or fine them money they'll steal the next day, and in the worst case jail in this country is probably more comfortable than life where they came from!
- Nigel, London, 14/08/2007 12:38
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It strikes me that the police in inner London are very poorly equipped to deal with this increase in crime! I think more and more gated communities will arise and private security companies will profit in a big way from this government mismanagement.
- Pedro, London N1, 14/08/2007 12:35
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The 20% figure is only representative of people that have been charged with an offence. In my local area, shopkeepers have been plagued by Eastern Europeans thieving from shops... the police don't even follow up. No doubt if they did, the people involved would "not speak English" and prosecution, unless caught red-handed, would be doubly difficult and expensive. Will any mainstream political party acknowledge the downside of mass immigration and propose a solution?
- Ab, London, 14/08/2007 12:27
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I am currently saving up to leave this country. It has had it. People still complain about the damage of the Thatcher years, nothing will ever come close to the damage of the Blair years.
- Jane, London, 14/08/2007 12:05
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An essential percentage missing from the article is how much of London's population is foreign. I would guess at least 40%. Hence, with 20% of crimes in London being committed by foreigners, this would indicate that 80% of the crimes are committed by British citizens who make up only 60% of the population in London. If that is true, foreigners in London are considerably less criminal than Britons. This would hardly be surprising as most foreigners come to the UK to become valued citizens, not criminals. Typical of the tories and others to jump to erroneous conclusions when it comes to immigration! So let us hear how many foreigners there are in London before we draw any conclusions.
- Nh, London, 14/08/2007 11:54
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