THE government’s attempts to make the country’s streets safer have been dealt a blow by a rise of about 12% in muggings, with some crime hot spots suffering increases of more than 40%.

Home Office figures to be published this week will disclose the biggest jump in street robberies for three years. The rise follows Tony Blair’s much publicised “street crime initiative”, which was launched in 2002. It cut crime for three years, but the new figures show muggings started rising again once the funding for specialist teams ran out early last year.

Police blame the increase mainly on “teen-on-teen” crimes in which children attack each other for desirable items such as mobile phones, iPods and bicycles.

The recorded crime figures were gathered last week from 26 of the 39 police forces in England. They show a small overall fall in crime, largely because of an 8% drop in burglary.

However, rising violence on the streets goes sharply against this trend. In Bedfordshire, for example, robberies, which consist largely of muggings, rose 50% in a year. In Durham they rose 48% and in London 19%. Police said half of all the street robberies in London involve mobile phone theft.

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