Public Services, Low-Level Crime, and the UK Legal System: An Analysis

Desklib provides past papers and solved assignments. This essay analyzes UK public services' role in crime reduction.

PUBLIC SERVICES LOW AND LEGAL SYSTEM
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Table of Contents
Introduction....................................................................................................................................................3
Discussion......................................................................................................................................................3
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................................6
Reference List................................................................................................................................................7
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Introduction
The public organisation to fight against different kinds of crimes has huge importance through
which they can mitigate certain criminal activities from society. UK public services have a vast
and diverse presence to fight crimes that helps the country to maintain a proper harmony in
society. In this essay, a brief discussion regarding the different public organisation and their roles
to fight crimes will be introduced properly.
Discussion
UK public service has a huge diversity that enables a proper helping hand to the legal system of
the UK to mitigate challenges regarding different legal issues. Public services such as Police,
Courts, Ministry of Justice, Her Majesty Prison and Probation Services and Her Majesty's
Crown Prosecution Service Inspectorate (HMCPSI) are the most important facilities and
services in order to maintain order in the justice system in the context of UK. It was mentioned
in a recent report that the UK has 43 different types of Police forces that have the primary duty to
prosecute, investigation of different criminal activities, arresting suspects based on collected
evidence through investigation and other range of public service activities. Police forces of the
UK have to follow a series of public service procedures in order to provide proper justice to
citizen regardless of any discrimination. In minor cases, polices forces generally have different
responsibilities as it is seen that they collect fixed penalties against such crimes. In the UK, there
are mainly two types of courts, which are The Magistrate’s Court and The Crown Court
(Orakhelashvili, 2018.). Both these courts have different functions as Crown court mostly deals
with serious cases such as criminal cases of Murder, Rape, Kidnapping and other serious
offences and Magistrate's courts generally deal with different civil cases such as cases regarding
civil cases and other cases related to the issues of youth in contexts of UK
(Instituteforgovernment.org.uk, 2019).
In the context of the UK legal system, it can be said that legal officers play a huge role in order
to maintain proper balance. Attorney general is one of the most important positions in the legal
system of the UK who properly utilise their power in order to mitigate fraud cases and services
regarding Crown Prosecution. Prisons have a huge role in the context of Public service in the
UK, the service is mainly provided through 122 prisons, and there are more than 108 public
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prisons. On the other hand, private companies mainly operate 14 private prisons in the context of
the UK. On the other hand, HM Prison Service has different responsibilities in the legal
processes of the UK. It was mentioned in a recent report that UK prisons have more than 50
thousand employees and the Secretary of State for Justice is the responsible person for prison
activities in the context of the UK (Pepper and Wolf, 2015).
Youth offending teams have the most important roles through which young people can be saved
from getting into certain legal troubles. They have different duties such as prevention programs
for crimes, helping arrested young people in the prison, helping the families of arrested young
people, supervising the services that are sentenced to youth people.
Police service is one of the basic public service bodies that have huge history regarding the
collaborative task in order to mitigate challenges regarding different criminal activities. It has the
most diverse duties as police forces are being used in the range of public services as well as they
are being used in different crime solving processes. On the other hand, in the UK, Country Police
Force also plays a huge role in crime controlling processes and they often work with different
security forces in order to fight against crimes (Sullivan and Skelcher, 2017). On the other hand,
both civil and criminal courts work with these police forces in order to acquire evidence. Both
these courts need evidence in order to introduce judgement and without proper investigation of
Police, proper judgements cannot be introduced through the court processes. There are also
government bodies that have certain police powers, help police investigations in both local and
international aspects. Duties of such enforcements were introduced Crime and Security Act
2001 as government agencies such as National Crime Agency (NCA), are one of such agencies
that fight against organised crimes with helps from combat specialists of different agencies. On
the other hand, organisations such as the Office for National Statistics (ONS) have huge
responsibilities in order to produce proper statistics to help in a court session (ons.gov.uk, 2019).
ONS introduces crime reports through data and statistics in order to highlight whether certain
government initiatives are successful or not to prevent criminal activities. The crime report of
ONS properly shows crime rates of England and Wales. The Crime Survey of England and
Wales (CSEW) has mentioned that criminal activities regarding the misuse of computer and data
became much higher in recent years but in the year of 2018, such criminal activities have been
decreased by a huge margin. The data in the report showed huge 33% fewer cybercrime
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activities. Therefore, it can be said new reforms regarding cyber activities to mitigate such
crimes are being properly used as clear positive outcomes can be acquired by this.
On the other hand, the report has shown an alarming sign for the police forces of UK as it is
mentioned that higher-arm violence; violence which is done by using different weapons have
been increased by 8%. Though crimes, by using firearms have been decreased by 4% still the
high rate of weapons-related crimes create huge concern among people of the UK. According to
the report, it is seen that police records regarding crime data are not designated as Statistics of a
Nation as these kinds of Data are being introduced through the additional special collection.
From the above-mentioned report regarding the serious crimes in the context of the UK, it can be
stated clearly that the Firearms Act 1968 is properly being maintained by UK government and
legislative bodies through which critical crimes by using firearms have been decreased by 4%.
On the other hand, the report also shows the failure of different police activities in order to
mitigate harms that are caused by harmful weapons. Therefore, it can be said that legal entities
such as police forces and other legal public services needed to be more careful to introduce
certain activities in order to mitigate such issues in the context of UK.
According to the report of CSEW, it is seen that 7.9% of women in the UK along with 4.2% of
men became the victims of domestic abuse and these rates are alarmingly high judging by the
number of female victims in recent years (ons.gov.uk, 2019). Through the statistics, it can be
said that UK legal bodies have shown proper positions against organised crimes but unable to
mitigate certain issues regarding domestic crimes which are the main reason of high percentage
of domestic crimes in recent years. The report also shows that the youth justice system of the UK
is having a better time as the crime rate among young children has been fallen by 82%, which
shows the capability of local, and government groups to mitigate social challenges of youth
crimes.
Prioritising crimes according to their volume and magnitude is one of the core processes of
police work in the context of the UK. It was mentioned in a recent report that crimes such as
Homicide and Knife crimes are at their all-time highest rates that are, therefore, considered as
one of the most important things to investigate the police. On the other hand, the continuous
growth of serious and Organised crimes are also one of the main concerns among legal entities of
the UK as Police and other government bodies are often included to mitigate such challenges
properly. Most of the time, it is seen that in organised crimes, the act of criminal activities take
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place among different countries which often create problems for local police where government
bodies have to play vital roles in order to mitigate such issues (ons.gov.uk, 2019). The issues of
fair treatment are one of the leading concerns among public service organisation related to the
criminal justice system in contexts of UK. As mentioned earlier, police often prioritise rimes
regarding their frequency and magnitude and by doing so, certain low-level civil criminal
activities are often being neglected as they come to the judiciary system in very high volume. In
order to appoint proper order in society, this type of practice must not be entertained as it has
direct effects on criminals.
Conclusion
Through the progress of the essay, it is identified that all public service organisations are needed
to be worked on the same motive that is to provide safety to different communities in the UK.
All mentioned public bodies play a proper team game and each individual plays their proper role
in order to introduce peace in the society. All these government agencies have different roles to
play and to keep crime at a bay; agencies often work with each other. UK crime reports show
that certain steps to mitigate criminal issues have introduced effective results and better results
are yet to acquire in different cases such as domestic violence. Therefore, UK government
agencies must focus on strategies through which contemporary high rated crimes can be
mitigated.
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Reference List
Instituteforgovernment.org.uk (2019) Prisons [Online] Available At
https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/publication/performance-tracker-2018/prisons
[Accessed 19th April 2019]
ons.gov.uk (2019) Crime and Justice Available At:
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice [Accessed 19th April
2019]
Ons.gov.uk (2019) Crime in England and Wales Available At
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/bulletins/
crimeinenglandandwales/yearendingseptember2018#overview-of-crime [Accessed 19th April
2019]
ons.gov.uk (2019) Domestic Abuse
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/articles/
domesticabusefindingsfromthecrimesurveyforenglandandwales/yearendingmarch2018 [Accessed
19th April 2019]
ons.gov.uk (2019) Sexual Assault Statistics Available At
https://www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/
sexualassaultstatistics [Accessed 19th April 2019]
Orakhelashvili, A., 2018. The High Court and the crime of aggression.
Pepper, I.K. and Wolf, R., 2015. Volunteering to serve: An international comparison of volunteer
police officers in a UK North East Police Force and a US Florida Sheriff’s Office. The Police
Journal, 88(3), pp.209-219.
Sullivan, H. and Skelcher, C., 2017. Working across boundaries: collaboration in public
services. Macmillan International Higher Education
Theguardian.com (2019) PoliceThe Guardian view on police priorities: they can’t do more with
less [Online] Available At https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/01/the-
guardian-view-on-police-priorities-they-cant-do-more-with-less[Accessed 19th April 2019]
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