PUBLICATION:              National Post

DATE:                         2003.07.28

EDITION:                    National

SECTION:                  Editorials

PAGE:                         A11

SOURCE:                   National Post

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Undercounting crime

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The cohort of Canadians most likely to commit crimes -- males 18 to 29 -- accounted for 10% of the population in 1975, but just 5% today. So it was no real surprise when Statistics Canada reported last Tuesday that the national crime rate had fallen in 2002 for the 11th consecutive year. But there is reason to believe the decline is smaller than the numbers show. Rather, ebbing public confidence in police, prosecutors and courts to pursue, capture and punish criminals is leading to fewer crimes being reported, while lenient new laws -- especially the new youth crimes law in effect since April -- are leading to fewer charges being laid. Since crimes reported and charges laid are common measures of criminal activity, a decline in either would make the crime rate appear to drop, even if the number of underlying offences did not.

Canadians are safer today from murder, armed robbery, assault and car theft than they were a decade ago. The official numbers for such major crimes are considered quite reliable by criminologists -- because police are likely to be informed of almost all major crimes. But less likely to be reported are vandalism, shoplifting, assault-free home break-ins, theft from cars, purse snatchings and other relatively minor crimes. This may be leading to a disconnect between ordinary Canadians' experience of crime and the official picture of the country's crime rates. Another Statistics Canada report, released in May, shows that only 37% of minor-crime victims report the criminal act in question to police, down from 42% in 1993. Unless the victims need a police report to make a claim against their insurance agency, they are likely to wonder what the point is. Increasingly, police do not even send investigators to residential or small business break-ins.

A great many Canadians have merely thrown up their hands and decided to live with a level of petty crime they would never have tolerated 30 or 40 years ago. The UN's International Crime Victimization Survey shows that 25% of Canadians claim each year to be victims of one crime or another, roughly the same percentage as a decade ago, when official crime rates began their supposed decline.

This false decline in crime statistics is only likely to worsen as the new Youth Criminal Justice Act takes full effect across the country. The Act specifically requires charges to be laid and young offenders to be prosecuted only as a last resort, with all remedies outside the criminal justice system to be attempted first. Bob Eaton, an Ontario probation officer, predicts that three years from now, the proponents of this ultra-lenient bill will claim "it has had a dramatic effect on reducing youth crime." But, he added, all this will be an accounting trick, like taking radar guns off the highways, then claiming the resulting lack of speeding tickets was proof fewer drivers were going too fast. Youth crimes will almost certainly go up -- as young offenders realize that even if they are caught they won't be charged; and even if charged they won't be incarcerated.

In other words, the rosy picture depicted by official statistics blurs reality: We're not as safe as Ottawa would have us think.