THE MOST DANGEROUS PLACES

TOP 20 AREAS WITH THE HIGHEST CRIME RATES OUTSIDE LONDON - crimes per 1,000 people

- By RICHARD AULT

A POPULAR seaside town has moved up the rankings to become the most dangerous place to live in England and Wales.

The latest Home Office figures show that recorded crime has continued to fall in England and Wales, with a 2% drop in all non-fraud crime in 2025 compared to the previous year.

That includes an 11% drop in burglary, 8% fall in theft, and a 6% decrease in homicide. However, some crime types went up, notably including sexual offences (by 5%), weapons possession (6%), and drug offences (18%).

The figures also reveal that some parts of the country are far more dangerous places to live than others.

Crime rates - calculated by dividing the number of crimes by the population size are generally considered the fairest way of comparing crime in areas of wildly different sizes.

They show that while the biggest cities, including Birmingham, Leeds, and Manchester, suffer the highest volumes of offences, residents of smaller areas are often more likely to encounter crime.

And of more than 250 council areas in England and Wales outside London, the most crime-ravaged place to live, according to the figures, is Blackpool.