60% of crimes in Manchester go unanswered, officer says

Only 40 percent of all reported crimes in Greater Manchester are investigated, leaving a large amount of criminal cases filed by the public unsolved, a high-ranking police officer says.

Sir Peter Fahy, chief constable of Greater Manchester Police (GMP) said only the “most serious crimes” and those that have a high likelihood to “produce evidence of the offender” can be dealt with due to an overwhelming amount of reported crimes.

“In practice, this translates into about 40 percent of crime being actively pursued at any time. We look at all crimes to identify patterns of offending and to build the picture of where we need to target police patrols,” Fahy said.

“In many crimes there are no witnesses, no CCTV and no forensic opportunities,” he added.

This comes as austerity measures bite into the salaries of the law enforcement in Britain and the government has reduced their resources needed to combat thugs.

According to a report by HMIC, which is responsible for the inspection of the police forces in England and Wales, the GMP has until March 2015 to slash police officer posts by 19 percent.

The cuts mean there will be 1,525 fewer police officers in GMP in the four years to 2015 and is equivalent to a budget cut of almost £150 million.

Greater Manchester has a population of 5.5 million and in April 2012-13 had over 300,000 reported crimes.