PUBLICATION:              Edmonton Journal

DATE:                         2003.07.30

EDITION:                    Final

SECTION:                  Opinion

PAGE:                         A12

COLUMN:                  Lorne Gunter

BYLINE:                     Lorne Gunter

SOURCE:                   The Edmonton Journal

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StatsCan figures don't mirror reality: A federal report that says crime has dropped 27% only shows that people are tired of reporting it

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Canadians are safer from crime than they were a decade ago. And we seem to feel safer, too. Law-and-order issues are not nearly as big a deal in politics as they were even five years ago. Still, we are not as safe as we were three or four decades ago. Nor are we as safe as those in charge of the criminal justice system would have us believe. It would be wrong to read too much good news into Statistics Canada's report this week that crime declined in 2002 for the 11th consecutive year.

To the extent we are safer (StatsCan reports a 27-per-cent decline in crime between 1991 and 2002) much of the credit goes to the effects of aging. Most crimes are committed by young men between the ages of 18 and 30, and that cohort now makes up just five per cent of the national population, half of what it was at the height of the baby boom.

This also explains why Alberta has a higher-than-average crime rate, despite having relatively high employment and strong wages: We have the youngest population in the country and thus one of the largest concentrations of men in their crime-committing years.

But another large part of the apparent decline comes from the underreporting of crime. We have learned to tolerate a much higher level of petty crime. Like a constant, low, droning buzz, we have grown so used to petty crime we now just tune it out. It's still there: it's just that we've trained ourselves not to notice.

We have thrown up our collective hands. Police no longer actively chase most vandals and break-in artists. If they do catch one, Crown prosecutors will plea bargain away any serious charges. And should some unlucky miscreant eventually make it before a judge, there's little chance he'll do serious time. His defence lawyer will discover some heretofore unknown constitutional right that has been violated, and he will be freed. Or the judge will refuse to sentence him harshly. Or the federal government will be, as it is now, on some fashionable kick to ensure no more than 50 per cent of convicted criminals ever see the inside of a prison cell.

We citizens aren't stupid. We can take a hint. We know when our real-life experiences of crime are not important to those in charge. So we don't report the crimes committed against us, and if we don't report them, they don't get counted in the crime-rate stats. Nearly two-thirds of the time, victims no longer bother to call the police when their garage is spray-painted, or a bike stolen from their yard or their purse snatched.

Police in many cities no longer respond in person to home and office break-ins in which no one is injured by the burglar. Victims are welcome to call in a complaint if they need an official police report to satisfy their insurance company. Victims'-service counsellors are standing by to help them deal with their victimization (which is one reason there were once five police officers on the streets for every civilian employed by a police force, whereas now there are fewer than three).

In the General Social Survey and the International Crime Victimization Study -- both also StatsCan reports dealing with crime -- Canadians admit they are still being victimized, they just aren't bothering to let authorities know. In 1993, 42 per cent of criminal acts were reported to police. Today, it is nearer 35 per cent.

Moreover, 25 per cent of Canadians each year claim to be victims of a crime, roughly the same percentage as a decade ago. If crime were falling as rapidly as reported, wouldn't the number of Canadians claiming to have been robbed, beaten or shot at be going down, too?

The choice of 1991 as a starting point is interesting as well. That year and 1992 were just about our worst crime years ever. By comparison, almost any other year is going to look good.

To see just how tolerant of crime we have become, we merely need to look at a fourth StatsCan report: Police Resources in Canada, 2002. Reported crimes may have gone down 27 per cent in the past eleven years. But since 1962 (a much better base year than 1991), total Criminal Code violations have increased by 286 per cent, while Canada's population has grown just 69 per cent.

That sounds like a whopping increase to me, not a praiseworthy decrease.

Also contained in the new StatsCan numbers was the tidbit that murders involving guns had fallen nearly 37 per cent since 1991. Immediately, the Liberals used this to insist their gun registry was working to reduce crime.

But all of that decline occurred between 1991 and 1998 -- before the registry was even in operation. Since the registry opened, gun murders have risen 13.2 per cent, hardly proof of the registry's success.

What's more, claims that a 62-per-cent drop in overall gun crimes can be attributed to the registry are no more credible than a claim that the 91-per-cent drop in major shoplifting is the result of the wedding registries many stores offer.

We're safer, sure -- just not that much safer.