Are UK drugs seizures really going up? The Home Office said exactly this in a press release last week but closer inspection reveals the most extraordinary statistical manipulation, rumbled by my colleague at the Centre for Policy Studies, Kathy Gyngell, who blogs on it here. Here’s the scam. The Home Office boasts about “a record 186,028 drug seizures by police and HMRC… an increase of 15 per cent’”. Clear enough. What purports to be a statistical bulletin makes the case further, showing the steady rise of seizures going back years plus a handy graph showing this triumphant, latent surge. But what about the amounts seized? Here is where one smells a rat. There is no graph, no historical data – in fact, not even a figure for the previous years. It simply states that 3.2 tonnes of heroin was seized.
One has to look up the Excel file to see what the Home Office is really up to, and get the real story.
Britain’s best politics newsletters
You get two free articles each week when you sign up to The Spectator’s emails.
Already a subscriber? Log in
Comments
Join the debate, free for a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first month free.
UNLOCK ACCESS Try a month freeAlready a subscriber? Log in