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We Already Have a Migrant Crime League Table

Yvette Cooper will publish a "league table" of "offences committed by foreign criminals living in the UK while awaiting deportation". The problem is that some nationalities are more likely to be deported than others.

3 min read

It was reported this week that “for the first time” Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, has ordered officials to publish an official “migrant crime league table”. Her decision is being heralded as a big win for opponents of mass immigration. Robert Jenrick, the former Tory leadership candidate, was quoted as saying that “following over a year of pressure from campaigners, including my own attempt to change the law”, there has been a “breakthrough”. However, this seems like an overstatement.

In the first place, the figures that Cooper has ordered officials to publish correspond to “offences committed by foreign criminals living in the UK while awaiting deportation”, which are a subset of all offences committed by foreign nationals. For example, many offences committed by foreign nationals currently residing in British prisons will presumably be excluded.

Don’t get me wrong: I support Cooper’s decision to publish the figures. When it comes to immigration, more data are better than less. And it’s certainly useful to know how many crimes are being committed by people who are subject to deportation and therefore shouldn’t even be in the country.

However, this doesn’t mean the figures will provide much insight into which nationalities commit the most crime — beyond what we already know. The reason is that some nationalities are more likely to be deported than others. Foreign criminals can only be deported if their home country is willing to take them back, which usually requires some kind of bilateral agreement. And even if there is such

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14 Comments
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Jack the dog
Jack the dog
1 year ago

Kind of welcome but only a baby step in the right direction.

Valuable chiefly as an indication that the political weather is finally starting to change on this vital issue.

Long long way to go.

RW
RW
1 year ago

Nationalities don’t commit crimes. People commit crimes and people also have a nationality. That there are lots of Albanian criminals in the UK doesn’t meant lots of Albanians are criminals (they might or might not be but nothing about this follows from the initial observation).

transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  RW

You’re right, but at a group level, some groups are more inclined than others to certain behaviours. The much more interesting question is what do you do with the information. There are various options, none of which will be followed.

RW
RW
1 year ago

Groups have no behaviour. If some set of people is artificially partioned into some set groups and one then looks for a certain propery among group members, the rate of occurence of the property will vary between the artificially created groups, as it would also vary for any other conceivable artificial partition. This is essentially historical information of no conceivable use beyond being descriptive for the period of time which is covered.

In addition to this, the population numbers used to calculate the imprisonment rates are estimates aka guesses as the actual numbers are unknown and the rates are really pretty low. Eg, according to the Noah Carl article, 70.3 of every 1000 Albanians in the UK are in prison. That’s 7.03% which means that about 13.2 Albanians in the UK aren’t in prison for every Albanian in the UK who is.

If you have an idea what should be done to these 13 Albanians because of the 1 Albanian in prison, I’d like to know about it. My idea would be nothing.

transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  RW

I would stop all immigration for a few centuries. If I ever restarted it I would favour races that had a track record of developing advanced civilisations whose history and culture were similar to ours- basically, white Europeans. I believe that would make our country a better place to live in than alternative approaches. As to those already here, deport all illegals and cut back welfare hoping that at least some of those making a negative contribution would decide to leave. Deport all foreign criminals.

RW
RW
1 year ago

That’s principally something I agree with. But not because of statistics like the one mentioned in this article which I consider essentially meaningless minus better truisms like Operations of criminals are more mobile than those of people who aren’t.

Mogwai
Mogwai
1 year ago

Bit of a change of tack from Farage here;

“But it is our intention, ultimately, that if you’ve come illegally, you should not be able to stay.”

”Nigel Farage has announced a change in Reform UK’s policy on illegal immigration, now seeming to support, at least in principle, the mass deportation of ALL illegal immigrants in Britain.

“I know the problem is huge, because there are an estimated 1.2 million people here illegally. And going beyond the last 100,000 is not going to be an easy job. It’s going to be one hell of a battle, and we know that the state, the apparatus of state, will fight us at every point.”

This follows his comments last year, in an interview with Steven Edginton on GB News, where he said it was not his ambition to deport all illegal immigrants, saying “it is a political impossibility.”

During the press conference, Farage also said:

“We will bring a total end to all asylum claims from people who have come here on travel visas, or who are overseas students.”

“We will demand the deportation of all foreign criminals.”

He promises Reform will appoint a Minister for Deportations if the win the next… Read more »

NeilParkin
NeilParkin
1 year ago
Reply to  Mogwai

They are still building the policy platform, and so some fluidity in the detail is to be expected.

LizT
LizT
1 year ago
Reply to  NeilParkin

Is that Neil-speak for Nigel’s flip flopping? He seems to be blowing in the wind these days, particularly since his chairman bought his way in and they set up yet another limited company together

transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago

Just look at US crime statistics by race.

Art Simtotic
Art Simtotic
1 year ago

Informative graph, but Pakistan and Bangladesh notably absent – camouflaged by British citizenship and/or difficult to track stats for non-citizens?

Marcus Aurelius knew
Marcus Aurelius knew
1 year ago
Reply to  Art Simtotic

They are on the chart. Both names overlaying each other, mixed in with Nigeria and Slovakia.

Art Simtotic
Art Simtotic
1 year ago

Okay thanks, gotcha.

CGW
CGW
1 year ago
Reply to  Art Simtotic

They are overwritten bottom left, just above Latvia and Slovakia.
The question is, what are our authorities going to do with this table? Ignore it, I suppose.

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