Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation: 2009 General Report

9. Crime Domain

9.1. The SIMD crime domain measures the rate of recorded SIMD crime at small area level using 2007-08 recorded crime data and is based on five indicators of broad crime types: crimes of violence; domestic house breaking; vandalism; drug offences; and minor assault. The indicators used were chosen on the basis of 1) relevance to impact on the local neighbourhood and 2) the availability of data. The crime domain score is a sum of the recorded crimes in each of the indicators and is referred to as ' SIMD crime' rather than total crime, as it does not include all recorded crimes. The indicators used in the crime domain are listed in Annex B.

9.2. The SIMD crime rate uses the resident population as the denominator. As such, the rates do not take into account short term increases in population, such as city centre daytime increases due to workers and shoppers or an increase due to regular events such as football matches or less regular events such as music festivals. This should be taken into account when comparing results across datazones.

Changes since SIMD 2006

9.3. No changes have been made to the domain indicators since SIMD 2006. As a result, the indicators and the overall domains between SIMD 2006 and SIMD 2009 are directly comparable.

9.4. The Crime domains between SIMD 2006 and SIMD 2009 are positively correlated with a Pearson's correlation coefficient of 0.84.

SIMD Crime by Local Authority

9.5. Chart 9.1 shows that of the 976 15% most deprived datazones in terms of SIMD crime, Glasgow contains the most at 18% (179 datazones) however, this has fallen from 22% (213 datazones) in SIMD 2006 and is a local share of 26%.

9.6. Edinburgh (10%, 100 datazones), North Lanarkshire (8%, 80 datazones), Fife (7%, 69 datazones) and Aberdeen (6%, 56 datazones) contribute the next highest number of deprived datazones in terms of SIMD crime.

Chart 9.1: National share of datazones in the 15% most deprived on the Crime domain by Local Authority

SIMD Crime by Police Force Areas

9.7. For SIMD 2009, Strathclyde Police Force Area has the largest number of datazones in the 15% most deprived in relation to crime, at 482 (49.4%) of Scotland's 976 datazones. This is a slight fall from 500 (51.2%) in SIMD 2006. Dumfries & Galloway have the smallest number, at 21 (2.2%) of the total number of datazones in the 15% most deprived datazones in Scotland in the crime domain of SIMD 2009.

9.8. The Lothian and Borders Police Force Area has seen the largest rise of 2.3% in the number of datazones in the police force area that fall in the 15% most deprived in the crime domain of SIMD 2009. The biggest fall of 2.4% can be seen in the Fife Police Force Area.

9.9. Strathclyde Police Force Area had the largest proportion of datazones in the police force area in the 15% most deprived in the crime domain of SIMD 2009, at 17.2% (down from 17.9% in 2006). Northern and Dumfries & Galloway had the smallest proportions, at 10.9% (8.3% and 12.4% in SIMD 2006, respectively).

Table 9.1: Share of 15% most deprived datazones in the crime domain of SIMD 2009, by Police Force Area

Police Force Area	Total number of datazones	15% Most Deprived Data Zones
		SIMD 2006			SIMD 2009
		No. of datazones	% of datazones in Police Force Area	% Share of Scotland's 15% Most Deprived	No. of datazones	% of datazones in Police Force Area	% Share of Scotland's 15% Most Deprived
Central	371	43	11.6%	4.4%	52	14.0%	5.3%
Dumfries & Galloway	193	24	12.4%	2.5%	21	10.9%	2.2%
Fife	453	93	20.5%	9.5%	69	15.2%	7.1%
Grampian	684	83	12.1%	8.5%	82	12.0%	8.4%
Lothian and Borders	1,122	145	12.9%	14.9%	168	15.0%	17.2%
Northern	385	32	8.3%	3.3%	42	10.9%	4.3%
Strathclyde	2,801	500	17.9%	51.2%	482	17.2%	49.4%
Tayside	496	56	11.3%	5.7%	60	12.1%	6.1%
Scotland	6,505	976	15.0%	100.0%	976	15.0%	100.0%

SIMD Crime by Urban Rural Classification

9.10. Table 9.2 shows the proportion and share of datazones in the 15% of areas that are most deprived in relation to crime, in terms of SIMD crime in 2009, are highest in Large Urban Areas. There is a clear urban rural split in the distribution, with low proportions of datazones in the 15% most deprived areas in terms of SIMD crime in Rural Areas (Accessible and Remote).

Table 9.2: Share of 15% Most Deprived Datazones in Terms of SIMD Crime, by Urban Rural Classification

Urban Rural Classification (2008)	Total Number of Data Zones	15% Most Deprived Data Zones
		SIMD 2006			SIMD 2009
		No. of Data Zones	% of Data Zones in Urban Rural Class	% Share of Scotland's 15% Most Deprived	No. of Data Zones	% of Data Zones in Urban Rural Class	% Share of Scotland's 15% Most Deprived
1. Large Urban Areas	2,454	495	20.2%	50.7%	498	20.3%	51.0%
2. Other Urban Areas	2,019	371	18.4%	38.0%	345	17.1%	35.3%
3. Accessible Small Towns	601	54	9.0%	5.5%	60	10.0%	6.1%
4. Remote Small Towns	252	45	17.9%	4.6%	43	17.1%	4.4%
5. Accessible Rural	742	8	1.1%	0.8%	21	2.8%	2.2%
6. Remote Rural	437	3	0.7%	0.3%	9	2.1%	0.9%
Scotland	6,505	976	15.0%	100.0%	976	15.0%	100.0%

9.11. Table 9.3 shows that the SIMD Crime rate is higher in Remote Small Towns (522 SIMD Crimes per 10,000 population) than in Accessible Small Towns (401 SIMD Crimes per 10,000 population).

Table 9.3: Count and Rate of SIMD Crime, by Urban Rural Classification

Urban Rural Classification (2008)	Total Population 2007	Number of SIMD Crimes	SIMD Crimes per 10,000 Population
1. Large Urban Areas	1,998,881	122,986	615
2. Other Urban Areas	1,555,063	83,440	537
3. Accessible Small Towns	461,318	18,486	401
4. Remote Small Towns	186,582	9,747	522
5. Accessible Rural	608,171	15,100	248
6. Remote Rural	334,186	7,444	223
Scotland	5,144,201	257,203	500

Change Over Time

9.12. Table 9.4 shows that in the crime domain, 302 datazones moved into the 15% most deprived in relation to crime, pushing the same number of datazones out of this category. Of those that moved into the 15% most deprived, the majority (289 datazones) saw crime rates increasing. Of those moving out of this category, all 302 datazones had a decrease in crime rates between SIMD 2006 and SIMD 2009. These figures show that absolute change is driving the change in ranks but as this is only the second year of crime data collected for the SIMD it is not possible to tell how much of this change is down to fluctuations in crime at small area level.

Table 9.4: Change in Crime Rate by Datazone, from SIMD 2006 Crime Domain to SIMD 2009 Crime Domain

Movement in crime domain between SIMD 2006 and SIMD 2009	Change in Crime rate
	Crime Rate Down	Change less than 5%	Crime Rate Up	2006 values supressed	Scotland total
Remained in 15% most deprived	359	101	214		674
Moved into 15% most deprived		12	289	1	302
Moved out of 15% most deprived	302				302
Remained in the 85% least deprived	2,592	383	1,815	437	5,227
Scotland total	3,253	496	2,318	438	6,505

9.13. Table 9.5 shows that 69% of the datazones in the 15% most crime deprived in Scotland in SIMD 2009 have remained in the 15% most deprived since SIMD 2006. This percentage varies across the police force areas with Northern seeing 55% and Fife seeing 83% of the most crime deprived datazones remaining in the 15% most deprived. Two thirds of the datazones remaining in the 15% most crime deprived are in Strathclyde and Lothian & Borders, though 60% of Scotland's datazones fall within these two police force areas.

Table 9.5: Shift of Datazones in the Crime Domain's 15% Most Deprived, from SIMD 2006 to SIMD 2009

Police Force Area	Total datazones in Police Force Area	Datazone movement in the Crime domain between SIMD 2006 and SIMD 2009
		Datazones moving out of 15% most deprived	Datazones remaining in 15% most deprived	Datazones moving into 15% most deprived
Central	371	13	30	22
Dumfries & Galloway	193	8	16	5
Fife	453	36	57	12
Grampian	684	19	64	18
Lothian and Borders	1,122	42	103	65
Northern	385	9	23	19
Strathclyde	2,801	158	342	140
Tayside	496	17	39	21
Scotland	6,505	302	674	302