Unnoticed in the pre-Christmas rush, the UK Statistics Authority has published a report on crime statistics.

It makes a series of sensible suggestions about how public confidence in the figures might be restored. There’s no reason, it says, to suppose that they are any less accurate than crime statistics in other countries, but the UK public just doesn’t believe in them.
 
Among recommendations is a call for more independent and transparent oversight, plus a regular commentary by the National Statistician to lend authority to the figures. The report is accessible on the authority’s website, and will be discussed at an open meeting at the Royal Statistical Society on January 18.