Recorded Crimes and Offences Involving Firearms, Scotland, 2020-21 and 2021-22

Annex 7: Statistical issues

Data presented in this bulletin relates to the most recent seven years. There are a small number of additional caveats to note when considering data from earlier years. These are outlined in earlier versions of this bulletin.

To calculate the figures shown in Table 3, the total number of offences involving a firearm are calculated as a percentage of all crimes and offences recorded by the police. These figures are derived from the Scottish Government’s Recorded Crime in Scotland statistical bulletin series. The figures are provided in Table A in the accompanying excel tables.

The main firearm is that which inflicts the most serious injury or damage. In cases where no injury or damage is caused, the firearm that is considered to potentially be the most dangerous is treated as the main weapon. The ‘other’ firearms category includes weapons such as starting guns and ball bearing guns. From 1988, crossbows were included in the ‘other’ category. The ‘imitation’ firearms category includes replica and imitation weapons.

Details of the age and sex of the main victim (Tables 11 and 11a) are collected only for offences in which fatal or non-fatal injury is caused. The main victim is the person most seriously injured. Cases involving injury to animals are recorded under the category ‘damage to property’ rather than ‘injury’ – which is reserved solely for the purpose of recording injuries to persons.

This bulletin presents information on all individual crimes and offences recorded by the police that involved the use of a firearm. As such, under circumstances where an individual was a victim of multiple offences involving a firearm at the same time (for example Threatening and abusive behaviour and Possessing a firearm with intent to endanger life), that individual will appear against all offences committed i.e. once each for the Threatening and abusive behaviour and Possession of a firearm with intent to endanger life. Therefore, care should be taken when comparing statistics on victims between multiple years as this data represents the number of offences involving a firearm that had a victim rather than all unique victims of firearms related incidents.

Details of the age and sex of the main accused (Tables 13 and 14) are collected for offences that are cleared up. In offences involving injury or damage, the main accused is the person who inflicts the most serious injury or damage. In other instances, it is taken to be the oldest person.

The figures provided in Table 16 for stolen firearms are not included elsewhere in this bulletin. The information reflects solely those incidents where firearms were stolen and not whether they were used to perpetrate a crime or offence.

Annex 2 mentions changes made to the data collection procedures made in the 2017-18 bulletin. Some areas only applied those changes to the 2017-18 recording year. The affected areas were the Highlands, Orkney Islands, Shetland Islands and Na h-Eileanan Siar. Given this, further caution should be exercised when making comparisons between 2017-18 onwards and previous years for these local authorities.