Number Of Stop And Searches In England And Wales Spiked By A Third In 2018/19

Police officers carried out a total of 383,629 stop and searches last year.
Shot of the back of a police officer's jacket with the word police written across the back
Shot of the back of a police officer's jacket with the word police written across the back
darrensp via Getty Images

The number of stop and searches carried out by police in England and Wales has jumped by almost a third in the past year, new figures have revealed.

Officers carried out 370,454 stop and searches under Section 1 of the Police And Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) in the year leading up to March 2019, according to a new Home Office report – a spike of 32% on the previous year.

The figures represent the first rise in eight years, with the number of stop and searches on a downward trend between 2010/11 and 2017/18.

Of the PACE stop and searches carried out by police last year, 58,251 led to an arrest – an increase of 21% on 2017/18.

Meanwhile, a further 13,175 stop and searches were carried out under the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act in anticipation of violence.

According to the report, which was published on Thursday, this is more than five times the number of searches made under this power the year before.

Of the 383,629 combined stops and searches, 279,601 resulted in no further action (73%).

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