Comment by zingar
1 day ago
I don’t understand why ONS should be expected to do anything but gather numbers. If good policing is the cause or reduction in alcohol consumption is the cause who cares?
Also, on looking for incentives the very obvious incentive to try discredit these orgs is so that politicians outside London can blame crime on immigration in the city that has the most immigrants.
This is straight out of the playbook of groups who want to manipulate public opinion so that they can get away with something that is not in the interests of the electorate.
Look at the US where these capabilities have been under siege since the start of this presidency, for example NASA’s climate data and the EPA’s air quality health impact measurement. Or more directly relevant: “immigrants are eating dogs and cats” and it doesn’t matter that the people who track crime professionally say “no they aren’t”.
It isn't the ONS. I believe it is a research unit of a university who collects this data, and they produce press releases on this dataset.
The reason why the difference is important is because it implies extremely different strategies to fixing it...obviously.
"politicians outside London"...ah, ofc, the Londoner conspiracy theory. It is wrong to blame immigrants for crime but correct to blame people outside London? The reason why people think there is a link between crime and immigration is because there is a link between crime and immigration. I am not sure what else can be said. You are implying that public opinion should be manipulated to hide this fact (even though this is already something the government does) whilst complaining about other people manipulating public opinion. Classic.
Just to clarify: you're saying the alcohol vs crime stats are from a research unit of a university? If so:
- I admit that I don't know much about ONS but its name suggests that they are not about research/speculation/anecdata into how we got where we are or how to fix it, they are just there to collect data - I would count the reduction in alcohol consumption as an extremely positive step for fixing problems; societal problems like crime need holistic solutions. What the correct solution is seems orthogonal to my point which is that stats orgs work hard to produce rigorous data and it is dangerous to undermine them in favour of groups (bloggers?) who have no such standards applied to their work
> It is wrong to blame immigrants for crime but correct to blame people outside London
I'm not sure what point you're making, I'm not blaming crime on people outside London. I imagine that the small amount of crime in London is committed by people in and around London. I expect the tiny minority of immigrants to be responsible for a tiny minority of those crimes.
> there is a link between crime and immigration
I'd be interested to read stats from a reputable source that applies the sort of rigour that the non-political civil servants who typically gather stats.
> You are implying that public opinion should be manipulated to hide this fact
I am stating that the fact of low crime rates in London should not be undermined in favour of conspiracy theories that are used to demonise the civil service.
Even if there is a link between crime and immigration the low rate makes it far less of a problem than the other societal problems we face, like the quick political points scored by demonising and hollowing out the civil service.
> even though this is already something the government does
This government already bows to this immigration nonsense. They are not a good example in your case.