AQW 11054/17-22

Ms Claire Sugden
Independent
East Londonderry

Tabled Date: 26/11/2020
Answered On Date: 10/12/2020
Priority Written: No

Question:
To ask the Minister of Justice, pursuant to AWQ 10079/17-22, further to her conversations with the Chief Constable and given the wider impact on work within her remit, for her assessment of the number of reported incidences of anti-social behaviour (i) since the beginning of lockdown in March 2020; and (ii) for the same period in each of the past two years.

Answer:

Based on the PSNI statistics for the period March to October of 2018, 2019 and 2020, published on the PSNI website, there were 40,443 incidents of anti-social behaviour (ASB) recorded in 2018, and over the same period in 2019 there were 40,059 incidents recorded, representing a fall of 1%.

Reporting trends for ASB incidents up to March 2020 appear to follow a similar pattern to those of the previous 12 months. Since the introduction of the COVID-19 restrictions (on 23rd March this year), levels of ASB have remained high compared with the same period in the two previous years, with 54,448 incidents recorded between March and October 2020. This figure represents an increase when compared to the same period in 2018 and 2019 of 35% and 36% respectively.

The PSNI have noted that the introduction of COVID-19 lockdown measures led to a substantial increase in levels of ASB.

While I would not draw definitive conclusions from these statistics, they do reflect the direct impact which breaches of COVID restrictions have had on ASB statistics, and provide an indicator of the wider impacts which COVID may have had on general ASB incidents.