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10,000 Cameras Ineffective At Deterring Crime
Mike writes "London has 10,000 crime-fighting CCTV cameras which cost £200 million but an analysis of the publicly funded spy network has cast serious doubt on its ability to help solve crime. In fact, four out of five of the boroughs with the most cameras have a record of solving crime that is below average. The study found that police are no more likely to catch offenders in areas with hundreds of cameras than in those with hardly any. Could this be an effective argument against the proliferation of cameras or will politicians simply ignore the facts and press ahead?"
I thought something very similar when I started reading the story, but the combinations of boroughs changed my mind. There are so many factors involved in crime clear up rate that this story is still fairly worthless (and it is from the evening standard, who love moaning about anything they can lay their hands on).
So, we have 5 'High camera' boroughs, they're all officially classed as inner london and have a correspondingly high crime rate. Of the 5 high camera boroughs, 2 sets of 2 are neighbours, Lewisham and Greenwich and Hackney and Tower Hamlets. Hackney and Tower Hamlets are an interesting pair, one has an above average clear up rate, and one has a lower than average clear up rate. These two boroughs between them (tower hamlets in whole and southern hackney) constitute the East End, traditionally thought of as one of the worst slums in Europe. The area consists mostly of social housing and old victorian terraces (for the gentrifiers), both boroughs have a stonkingly high crime rate (especially Hackney, which has a feirce reputation for drugs, guns and violent crime). Discussing the subtle differences between the boroughs (of which there are many) is outside the scope of the post, my point is that the factors that effect crime are broadly similar, as is the crime rate and number of cameras. Some other factor is effecting the clear up rate.
As for the low camera boroughs, the average price for a house in 'The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea' is now over $2,000,000US and Sutton is an affluent southwestern suburb flirting with rural Surrey with one of the lowest crime rates in London. Waltham Forest however is home to some of the poorest and most deprived neighbourhoods in London, lying just NE of Hackney.
My point is that to look at the clear up rate and number of CCTV cameras is really oversimplistic, but that's what the evening standard does.