Crime fell by 10 per cent in England and Wales last year to bring the longest decline in offending in living memory, according to official figures.

Despite mounting public concern at knife crime, and more than 350 such offences committed every day, attacks with knives and other violent crimes were down, statistics published yesterday showed. As ministers hailed a 10 per cent fall to 10.1 million offences in the British Crime Survey and a 9 per cent fall to 4.9 million in offences recorded by the police, however, Paul Wiles, the Home Office chief statistician, said that future trends might be upward.

Professor Wiles said that the economic downturn might lead to rising property crimes after years of falling car thefts and residential burglaries. “Depending on the extent of the downturn, that will put upward pressure on property crime,” he said.

The level of falling violent crime was at odds with the public’s perception of their chances of being attacked. “It is possible to have an overall decline in violence nationally while having outbreaks of violent crimes in particular places, in particular concentrations,” he said.

Despite falls in overall crime, almost two thirds of people thought that it was rising. Most blamed drugs and lack of discipline by parents as the chief causes of crime.

Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, said that she was very pleased with the overall figures. She said: “While the BCS shows violence falling by 40 per cent since 1997, with a 12 per cent fall in the last year alone, we also know that knives are still being used in the most serious violent incidents.”

Two sets of figures published yesterday gave widely different estimates on the extent of knife crime. Figures collected by police, which measured knife offences for the first time, recorded more than 22,000 offences, including 231 attempted murders, 14,000 robberies and 8,000 woundings.

More than half of serious knife crimes recorded by police were in three areas. London had the most, with 7,400, followed by the West Midlands and Greater Manchester.

The British Crime Survey, a broader exercise based on interviews with 47,000 people, found that there were an estimated 130,000 knife offences. Even the survey figure is likely to be an underestimate as it does not include offences involving children under 16 or those committed on commercial premises.

Overall, both the British Crime Survey figures and those recorded by police forces in England and Wales were down, or stable, apart from a rise in drug offending recorded by police. Levels of violent crime, vehicle-related theft and vandalism all fell by more than 10 per cent, according to the British Crime Survey, while domestic burglary and thefts from the person were similar to last year.

Burglary and vehicle crime has fallen by two thirds since 1995 - largely because of the installation of security devices in homes and cars.

Sexual offences, violence, robbery, criminal damage and domestic burglary all fell, according to police figures. The number of killings rose 3 per cent to 784 in 2007-08, firearm offences by 2 per cent to 9,803 and drug offences by 18 per cent to 229,000.

Although firearm offences were up, more than half of gun crime was in London, the West Midlands and Greater Manchester. The three areas also accounted for more than half of the most serious violent knife crimes.

The Home Office said that the rise in drug offences was due to an increase in the number of people caught in possession of cannabis. This was linked to an increased use of police powers to issue warnings for being found with the drug. Overall, use of drugs among those aged 16-24 is at its lowest level since 1995, according to the British Crime Survey. The figures show that 21.3 per cent of that age group had used an illegal drug in 2007-08 compared with 24.1 per cent in the previous year.

The survey suggests that the prevalence of cannabis used among the 16-24 group has fallen from 26 to 17.9 per cent since 1995.

Dominic Grieve, the Shadow Home Secretary, said: “The fact that violent crime has risen by 80 per cent under Labour and the scale of knife crime on our streets is a shocking indictment of Labour’s failure to tackle crime.”

Chris Huhne, Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, said: “The public has lost faith in the crime figures. The Government tells them crime is falling but a rising number of people think it is getting worse.” Extremists and single-issue groups could influence policing under plans to allow direct elections to authorities overseeing police services, the Government was warned last night.

The Association of Police Authorities said that there was a “very real danger” that direct elections would attract extremists intent on influencing policing for their own ends.

The Home Office plan is part of a reform package that involves the scrapping of all but one government-set target for the police service.

Four targets are being scrapped, including one for the proportion of ethnic minority officers employed in each force. Police officers will also be required to respond to emergencies within 15 minutes and attend nonemergency calls within 48 hours.

Fair cop, dodgy cop

Why crime might be falling

- Years of economic growth

- More burglar alarms and window locks

- Better security measures in cars

- There are fewer younger people, who are largely those involved in crime

Why we should be sceptical

- BCS does not cover crime committed by those under 16

- Nor commercial crime

- No overall measure of identity fraud

- Does BCS reflect the full extent of inner-city crime among young?

- Underreporting to police

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