New crime figures expose Southport MP’s “posturing” says Labour’s Liz

New crime figures have exposed the awful reality of the government’s failings and the “posturing” of Southport’s Tory MP, it’s been claimed.

Latest statistics show that nationally violent crime has jumped yet again, by nearly a fifth, and robbery is up just two percent less at 17 %. Overall crime (minus fraud) rose for yet another year running, up by 7%.

The figures for the Merseyside force area make even starker reading, with violence up nearly a third at 32% and weapons offences jumping by 22%. Overall crime was up 11%.

Liz Savage, Labour’s Parliamentary Candidate for Southport, says the latest figures reveal how hollow Conservative claims about crime really are:

“Thanks to the Tories and Lib Dems police funding was cut by £2.3 billion, causing devastation to police services.”

“Southport’s Tory MP has even voted for further cuts since then and yet now tries to complain about officers having to be diverted from Southport to help deal with incidents in other parts of the force area. I have a simple message for him – it is your fault.”

“You, your government and the Lib Dems all have contributed to cuts in police funding and we now have ever rising crime.”

“When you cut over 1,100 Merseyside police officers, which is a staggering one in four officers lost locally, and that is coupled with a one in two loss of PCSOs, then it is not surprising Merseyside Police is hugely overstretched.”

“To complain about officers then having to be diverted when you have been complicit in those cuts is little more than obscene posturing.”

“Public safety on the cheap simply cheapens public safety. No wonder local residents are complaining in the media of being afraid to go out at night.”

“Southport’s MP meanwhile is busy trying to shift blame and attention elsewhere and doing so is a disservice to a force and its officers struggling to cope in circumstances that this government and their former partners have deliberately created.”

“Labour will make public safety a priority and put 10,000 officers back in our communities.”