Disturbing sex assault hidden truth revealed in latest crime figures

Alarming data shows nearly two in 10 adults in England and Wales were victims of sex assault in the year to March.

Figures published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) estimates around 900,000 over-16s had experienced sexual assault, including attempted offences. The figures reveal that one in eight for women experienced domestic abuse, sexual assault or stalking in that time.

Statisticians say the figures have not changed drastically in the past year. Labour has promised to halve cases of violence against women and girls within a decade after describing it as a "national emergency" when they came to power last year.

The latest report showed:

• 7.8% of people aged 16 years and over (around 3.8 million people) had experienced domestic abuse in the last year

• 2.9% (around 1.4 million people) had experienced stalking

• 1.9% (around 900,000 people) had experienced sexual assault

• 8.6% (around 4.2 million people) had experienced some form of harassment

The Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) did however find that knife crime and robberies fell slightly in the year to March. However shoplifting continued to rocket to record levels, and fraud was at record levels.

There were an estimated 53,685 crimes involving knives or sharp incidents, the data shows - a 1% fall. Firearm offences dropped by 21%, while there was a 3% fall in robberies, down to 78,804 cases from over 81,000 a year earlier.

But a record 530,643 shoplifting offences were reported - the highest figure since current recording processes began in 2003.

A massive rise in fraud - which went up by 31% - meant that over-16s experienced 9.4million incidents of crime, up from 8.8million the year before, ONS said.

This included 4.2 million fraud cases, the highest on record. But there has been a sharp drop in overall crime in the past decade.

The overall total of 9.4 million crimes is 16% lower than the total of 11.2 million for 2016/17.

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