Andrew Rawnsley's thoughtful overview of the putative reasons behind the welcome overall reductions in the crime figures have, he notes, confounded criminologists and policy-makers ("A crime mystery. It's going down, but no one really knows why", Comment). His piece did, however, omit any reference to the attested success of the probation service over recent years in contributing to reducing reoffending. Ministry of Justice data between 2000 and 2010 demonstrates reductions in adult reoffending of over 3%.

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