TERRIFYING figures revealed yesterday how Labour has virtually surrendered parts of Britain to gun gangs.
Armed robberies and other firearms offences rocketed by 35 PER CENT in the past year — with handgun use up by a record 46 per cent.
Major towns and cities are hovering on the brink of lawlessness as violence hits a terrifying new peak.
The spiralling law-and-order crisis — involving steep rises in almost EVERY type of offence — was revealed in official Home Office crime figures.
The statistics, which showed gun crime up by a nightmarish 103 per cent since Labour took power, left Tony Blair’s “tough on crime” pledge in tatters.
And they were a severe blow to Home Secretary David Blunkett, who has persuaded the PM to pump an extra £20million into beating street crime — only to see it get worse.
In the past year, ROBBERY rose by 14.5 per cent, BURGLARY 7.9 per cent, SEX OFFENCES 18.2 per cent and ASSAULT 19 per cent.
But police chiefs are most alarmed by the horrifying rise in gun crime.
Offences have leapt DESPITE the ban on handguns introduced in the wake of the 1996 Dunblane school massacre.
Yesterday’s recorded crime figures showed armed robbery at its highest level since 1993 — with 97 people killed and 558 seriously injured last year. Weapons were used in 9,974 offences — more than a third up on the previous year’s peak of 7,362 and more than double the 4,903 total in 1997-98.
Handguns were used in 5,871 crimes in 2001-2 — with criminals brandishing them in seven out of ten armed robberies.
Meanwhile the number of victims killed by guns — 23 last year — is up by almost a third. Three out of four gun crimes were committed in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds and Liverpool.
In these areas, the number of gun offences soared by almost 50 per cent in the past year. Last night campaigners claimed Mr Blair had lost the plot on crime and the country was in the grip of gun law.
Norman Brennan, a police officer who set up the Victims of Crime Trust, said: “The entire criminal justice system is in a state of collapse.
“All our warnings to the Government over the past decade have fallen on deaf ears.”
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Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith blamed the Government’s softly-softly stance on drugs for the explosion in gun crime.
He said: “The huge increase in drugs is ripping apart our inner cities and fuelling this huge rise in gun culture.
“Society in these areas is becoming almost lawless. The concept of gang culture has to be crushed.”
Mr Blair’s proud boast that burglary had fallen since he won power was also shattered.
The number of houses broken into had dropped year-on-year from 1,015,075 in 1997 to 836,027 in 2000-1.
But by last year it was back up again to 878,535 — a rise of five per cent.
Highway robbery has also rocketed, with firearms crimes on public roads up 47 per cent. Armed raids on shops rose by 27 per cent, according to the shock figures.
Shadow home secretary Oliver Letwin last night blasted the astonishing statistics.
He said: “These figures are truly terrible. “Despite the street crime initiative, robbery is massively up. So are domestic burglary, retail burglary and drug offences.”
Mr Letwin dismissed the recent ban on fake guns rushed through on Thursday and the five-year sentence for gun crime as “panic measures and gimmicks”.
He added: “The only word for this is failure. “The Government’s response of knee-jerk reactions, gimmicks and initiatives is not working and confused signals on sentences for burglary will not help either.
“The figures will continue to be dreadful until the Government produces a coherent long- term strategy to attack crime at its roots and get police visibly back on our streets.”
Lib-Dem home affairs spokesman Simon Hughes said: “Guns should have no place in British society.
“These figures must prompt a new, tougher approach towards people who carry them. “Gangs which use and glorify guns as status symbols must be relentlessly targeted by the police.”
Police chiefs last night expressed grave concerns over soaring gun crime.
Peter Hampson, head of the Association of Chief Police Officers crime policy and Chief Constable of West Mercia, said: “The recent rise in firearms offences concerns us all.
“We support the Government’s intention to strengthen the law in relation to illegally-held firearms.
“And the Police Service is working closely with the Government and other agencies to try to reverse the trend in the illegal possession and use of firearms.
“We have also been working on ways to reduce the availability of crack cocaine which fuels criminality.”
Mr Blunkett will today host a crisis summit with cops and community leaders in a desperate bid to halt the crimewave.
He said: “Fighting gun crime is a vitally important issue and we are working hard to tackle the problem.
“We have demonstrated that this continues to be a priority by toughening the laws on illegal weapons, air guns and replica weapons.”
The Home Secretary earlier denied a U-turn over mandatory five-year sentences for possessing illegal guns.Mr Blair first uttered his “tough on the causes of crime” mantra nearly a decade ago.
The PM — then Shadow Home Secretary under Labour leader John Smith — used the phrase in an address to the 1993 Labour Party conference.
In a bid to steal the Tories’ claim to be the party of law and order, he said: “The Labour Party is the party of law and order in Britain today — tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime.”
He went on to repeat his pledge in Labour’s pre-election manifesto of April 1997.
Minister's whitewash bid
THE Government flew in the face of hard facts yesterday — and insisted crime is FALLING.
Home Office Minister John Denham wheeled out figures from an opinion poll — choosing to ignore concrete police statistics.
He said: “This survey is the most reliable indicator of crime trends. It shows a seven per cent drop in crime and a drop in the fear of crime.”
Mr Denham based his amazing remarks on the British Crime Survey, which quizzes 40,000 people about their experience of crime.
Directly contradicting official statistics, the survey claims violent crime has dropped by two per cent,burglary by seven per cent and car theft by 14 per cent.
Mr Denham said the chance of being a crime victim was the lowest in 20 years. And he added: “The survey shows crime has been falling since 1997 and the risk of being a victim is very low.”
But Tories dismissed his reliance on the poll as “spin”.
