Watford High Street one of most violent streets in Britain, say police statistics

Official police statistics reveal that High Street, which is otherwise known as The Parade in the town centre in part, has 201 offences every month on average.

That places it fourth on the list of having the most violent crimes committed, behind Antrim’s Muckamore Abbey Hospital (677), Meridian Square in Stratford, London (235), Belfast Airport (229), with Birmingham’s Broad Street fifth (175).

The figures were taken from offences recorded between January 2012 and June 2013.

The unenviable placing comes after last year’s news that Watford was credited with having the most violent street in Britain due to a statistical skew, according to police bosses in the town.

Council spokesman Peter Nelson said: "Watford has got no worse crime than any other town of its size/make-up.

"This story has popped up a few times since the website was launched.

"The website works on the basis of listing the number of crimes/anti-social behaviour incidents against the background resident population - ie crimes per thousand population who actually live in the area.

"Therefore places like town centres, with night-time economy or transport hubs, which have very low resident populations but ten thousands of visitors etc appear to have high crime rates, as the website statistical rate is measured against the very low resident population and not the high visitor population.

"Figures make the High Street seem much, much worse than it is, due to the low population, the fact that the police will register an incident as ‘High Street’ for reporting purposes and the fact that hundreds thousands of people visit Watford [as a regional shopping/centre]."

After last year’s news that Watford’s Albert Road South was the worst street for violence in Britain, Inspector Deirdre Dent told borough councillors the reason for this was its position near the High Street and large businesses such as Sainsbury’s and Oceana, which inflated the number of crimes recorded.