Crime survey highlights need to focus on root causes of knife crime and drink culture (Dumfries Liberal Democrats)

Dumfries Liberal Democrats <tom@therussells.org.uk>

Crime survey highlights need to focus on root causes of knife crime and drink culture

October 27, 2009 6:06 PM
Originally published by Scottish Liberal Democrats

Robert BrownLiberal Democrat Justice spokesperson Robert Brown MSP has called for action from Scottish Ministers to clamp down on Scotland's culture of drink fuelled violence.

Mr Brown's calls come as the Scottish Crime and Justice Survey (SCJS) 2008-09 found that in 58% of violent crimes in Scotland victims said the offenders were under the influence of alcohol.

This is almost 10% higher than the same statistics for England and Wales.

In addition the survey highlights that offenders carried a knife in as many as 31,200 of the total crimes recorded in the SCJS.

Commenting, Mr Brown said:

"We must focus on tackling the reasons why people choose to carry a knife or drink themselves stupid in the first place if we are ever to make a real impact on these figures.

"It is tackling these root causes that must be the priority and not the hollow, headline grabbing policies of Labour and the Tories on these issues.

"Violent crimes of assault or robbery account for almost a third of all crimes recorded in this survey. Victims have reported that the offenders were under the influence of alcohol in more than half of these cases.

"This means alcohol was a factor in 185,600 violent crimes last year. This is even more concerning when combined with the 31,200 cases of knife crime.

"Scotland's violent culture of alcohol fuelled crime is simply unacceptable. These figures highlight just how much of an impact it has on our crime rates.

"Ministers must take immediate action to clamp down on Scotland's culture of drink fuelled violent crime."