Statistics and Registration Service Bill

If that were true I would think it was the problem, but the figures are published in their entirety. If it were true that only the burglary figures were published, that would be a problem. If Ministers came to the House and said, ““We are keeping knife crime a secret from you””, that would be a real problem—but they do not. There may be a debate about Ministers’ response—about whether a knife amnesty was the correct response, for instance. It is right for Parliament to debate such matters, but it is not true that Ministers should not respond to a change in the number of people carrying knives. It would be bizarre if Parliament did not have a view on whether Ministers’ response to knife crime was the right one, but it would be odd indeed to suggest that Ministers should not come to the House with a view on knife crime. It would be immature of the House not to be able to handle the fact that there has been a change in the incidence of knife crime. That is a simple fact. There is a difference between the fact that there have been statistical changes in crime, going in different directions, and—if the statistics have been published, as they have been—the issue of whether Ministers have responded correctly.