CRIME in Scarborough has risen by 20 per cent during the past 12 months - new figures reveal.

And violence, theft and criminal damage, and arson make up the bulk of the borough’s crimes - which jumped from 7,683 reported incidents in 2017/18 to 9,214 in 2018/19.

Chief inspector Rachel Wood, from North Yorkshire Police, told a Scarborough Council meeting that the public had more “confidence” to report crimes to the force.

She said: “You will all see from the report that the crime figures have gone up and there isn’t a single factor that can be attributed to this but we will see there is the national trend which shows that crime is going up.

“One of the key factors is around confidence and trust so the more as a team we are out together, the more we are engaging with the public, the more we are building that trust and confidence the more we are asking people help us understand what is really going on then we are going to get more crimes reported to us.

“In some respects that is a positive because it shows people have got more confidence.”