Version: 4.0.0 | Published: 3 Jul 2025 | Updated: 2 days ago
Crime Survey for England and Wales
Dataset
Summary
Citation:
Office for National Statistics, released 30 June 2025, ONS SRS Metadata
Catalogue, dataset, Crime Survey for England and Wales,
https://doi.org/10.57906/bs66-9627
DOI Name:
Documentation
Associated Media:
Description:
The Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) – formerly known as the British Crime Survey (BCS) – is a face-to-face victimisation survey, which asks people resident in households in England and Wales about their experiences of a
selected range of offences in the 12 months prior to the interview.
The face-to-face CSEW was suspended on 17 March 2020 as part of the efforts to minimise social contact and stop the spread of COVID-19. This was temporarily replaced by the Telephone-operated Crime Survey for England and Wales (TCSEW), which ran from May 2020 and was discontinued in March 2022. Face-to-face interviewing resumed in October 2021. Estimates from the CSEW are not directly comparable with those published from the TCSEW.
The datasets available for users include the Non-Victim Form (NVF), where each case refers to an individual respondent and includes victims and non-victims, and the Victim form (VF), where each case refers to an individual incident reported by a respondent. The VF dataset only includes those who have been a victim of crime.
The NVF dataset includes perceptions of crime in the local area, attitudes towards the Criminal Justice System (CJS), experiences of the police, crime prevention and security, anti-social behaviour, demographics and media, crime
incidence and prevalence rates.
The VF dataset contains offence-level data on nature and circumstances of an incident, details of offenders, security measures, costs, emotional reactions, contact with the CJS and outcomes where known.
Data from the self-completion modules and geographic variables lower than Police Force Area (PFA) are not available from the End User Licence (EUL) datasets, but can be accessed via the ONS Secure Research Service (SRS) and
the Secure Lab. Analysts who need to access these data for their research can request access under the terms of the ONS Approved Researcher method through the UK Data Service.
Detailed information about the structure of the datasets can be found in the associated metadata guide.
Coverage
Spatial
Spatial Coverage:
- England
- Wales
Geographical Levels:
- local authority district
- lsoa11
- msoa11
- region
Temporal
Start Date:
01 January 1981
Latest Data:
31 March 2023
Frequency:
ANNUAL
Distribution Release Date:
30 June 2025
Provenance
Source:
Survey
Access and Governance
Usage
Condition of Access:
Access needs approval
Condition of Use:
Standard conditions for the use of data in the SRS
Resource Creator:
Office for National Statistics
Access
Access Service:
- Safe Rooms, SafePods
- Assured Organisational Connectivity – office based
- Assured Organisational Connectivity – remote access
Jurisdictions:
GB-EAW
Data Controller:
Office for National Statistics
Access Level:
Access Level 3
Format and Standards
Languages:
en
Formats:
SPSS
Enrichment and Linkage
Related Datasets:
British Crime Survey - England and Wales
Origin
Name:
ONS SRS Metadata Catalogue