The most dangerous places to live in England and Wales have been revealed by new Home Office figures while separate figures from the ONS suggest people experienced 9.4 million incidents of crime
23:11, 10 Aug 2025Updated 23:11, 10 Aug 2025
Crime figures reveal the most dangerous place to live in England and Wales(Image: Getty)
Middlesbrough has been named the most dangerous place to live in England and Wales, according to latest crime figures. Some 23,000 crimes were record in the North Yorkshire town last year, a crime rate of 158 offences for every 1,000 people.
The crime-plagued town saw a fall of 5% from the previous year, but it is still the equivalent of one in every six people who live there falling victim to a crime last year.
After Middlesbrough, Blackpool in Lancashire has the highest crime rate at 154 crimes per 1,000 people, a fraction higher than affluent Kensington and Chelsea in west London, which has 154, followed by Manchester with 152 and Hartlepool with 142.
Is your town on the top 20 worst affected areas?(Image: PA)
While Westminster consistently has the highest crime rate in the country — currently at 423 crimes for every 1,000 residents — that includes huge numbers of tourists who are targeted by thieves and other criminals every year. The same is likely true of Camden, which has 195 crimes per 1,000 residents.
New Home Office figures show that in the year ending March 2025, more than 5.3 million non-fraud crimes were recorded by the 43 domestic police forces in towns and cities across England and Wales. That was about 92,000 fewer crimes than in the year ending March 2024, a 2% fall.
Avon and Somerset Constabulary and Devon and Cornwall Police saw the biggest drop in non-fraud crime, by 12% in both police force areas. But crime is rising in some parts of the nation.
Crime-plagued Middlesbrough is the most dangerous place to live in the UK, figures show(Image: Teessidelive)
Avon and Somerset Police, which has been using AI technology and algorithms to weigh up the risk of allowing suspects out on bail, witnessed the biggest rise in non-fraud crime, at 12%, which represents around 18,000 more crimes.
Crime also went up by 18% in Cheltenham, 18% in Forest of Dean, by 16% in Cotswold, and 16% in Stroud, all in the Gloucestershire police force area. However, all those areas are relatively low in crime.
Meanwhile, separate figures from the ONS Crime Survey for England and Wales suggest people aged 16 and over experienced 9.4 million incidents of crime in the year to March 2025, up from 8.8 million in the previous 12 months, the Express reports.
Seaside resort Blackpool also ranked high on the list(Image: Manchester Evening News)
The 20 areas with the highest crime rates per 1,000 of population are:
Westminster 423.2
Camden 194.8
Middlesbrough 158.3
Blackpool 154.4
Kensington and Chelsea 154.2
Manchester 152.4
Hartlepool 141.5
Islington 140.8
Bristol 132.3
Southwark 127.6
Hackney 124.4
Lincoln 124.3
Doncaster 124.2
Bradford 124.2
Southampton 124
Liverpool 123.7
Kingston upon Hull 122.9
Leeds 122.7
Newport 120.5
Blaenau Gwent 119.5
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