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The offences in the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 include graffiti and fly-posting. Other offences are taken under different legislation.
The number of prosecutions taken at magistrates courts is held by the Ministry of Justice. The offence class of ‘other’ criminal damage includes, but cannot separately identify, offences of graffiti. Data on fly-posting offences cannot be separately identified from the data held by the Ministry of Justice.
Police force area 2003 2004 2005 2006 England Avon and Somerset 814 652 576 240 Bedfordshire 35 58 53 206 Cambridgeshire 309 252 233 152 Cheshire 12 51 51 177 City of London 16 11 — 11 Cleveland 162 75 29 12 Cumbria 28 49 91 83 Derbyshire 362 346 244 185 Devon and Cornwall 12 6 63 1,016 Dorset 2 — 2 4 Durham 195 156 76 88 Essex 565 522 561 486 Gloucestershire 141 162 178 245 Greater Manchester 1,329 1,467 1,424 1,457 Hampshire 667 767 374 510 Hertfordshire 48 135 189 108 Humberside 39 185 90 81 Kent 539 718 656 713 Lancashire 25 24 39 183 Leicestershire 67 81 91 62 Lincolnshire 9 68 95 106 Merseyside 271 201 70 85 Metropolitan Police 1,970 1,798 1,465 1,422 Norfolk 362 318 356 245 North Yorkshire 241 372 365 305 Northamptonshire 299 259 289 308 Northumbria 14 11 15 29 Nottinghamshire 14 10 136 200 South Yorkshire 404 422 442 412 Staffordshire 615^ 551 543 520 Suffolk 14 52 168 417 Surrey 93 72 196 404 Sussex 587 367 463 513 Thames Valley 478 370 410 356 Warwickshire 81 59 42 22 West Mercia 102 145 162 161 West Midlands 1,269 1,409 1,090 1,024 West Yorkshire 467 441 440 410 Wiltshire 85 61 68 44 Wales Dyfed-Powys 9 11 15. 10 Gwent 345 223 74 98 North Wales 297 326 378 315 South Wales 459 96 66 53
DEFRA collects data annually from local authorities on Fixed Penalty Notices (FPNs). FPNs can be issued by local authorities for graffiti and fly-posting offences. A FPN can be offered as an alternative to prosecution but prosecution can still be taken in instances of non-payment of a FPN. Police Community Support Officers can issue FPNs if they have the relevant approval; such notices are issued on a local authority’s behalf, and are incorporated into the local authority’s figures. For ease of reference, nil returns have been omitted from the following tables, which include the number of prosecutions taken following non-payment of FPNs.
Offence: graffiti Local authority Prosecutions following non payment Reporting period: April 2006 to March 2007 Gateshead BC 1 Kingston upon Hull City Council 1 Sandwell BC 2 Reporting period: April 2005 to March 2006 Gateshead BC 5 Newcastle upon Tyne CC 2 Reporting period: April 2004 to March 2005 Newcastle upon Tyne CC 2
Offence: fly-posting Local authority Prosecutions following non payment Reporting period: April 2006 to March 2007 Canterbury CC 1 Castle Point DC 2 LB Bexley 20 LB Ealing 5 Manchester CC 4 Milton Keynes BC 1 Newcastle upon Tyne CC 1 Nottingham CC 1 Peterborough CC 14 Rochdale BC 8 S Ribble BC 2 Selby DC 1 Sheffield CC 2 Solihull BC 1 Thurrock BC 1 Reporting period: April 2005 to March 2006 Nottingham CC 1 Peterborough CC 1 Solihull BC 1 Southampton CC 1 Tameside BC 3 Reporting period: April 2004 to March 2005 Cheltenham BC 2 Gloucester CC 1 Newcastle upon Tyne CC 2 Thurrock BC 1 Westminster CC 7
The House Library has been furnished with data on prosecutions and fixed penalty notices issued for other offences under the relevant legislation.
The data are also currently published online.