Who is most at risk?
[ch 1: page 9]The Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) is a large, nationally representative, household survey that has been carried out since 1982. The main purpose of the survey is to measure the extent and nature of “criminal victimisation” against adults, aged 16 or over, living in private households in England and Wales.
The 2014/15 survey results show that the occupational groups most at risk of assaults or threats at work are those in protective service occupations. This group includes police officers, fire service officers, prison service officers and police community support officers (PCSOs). They faced nearly a 10% chance of being assaulted or threatened when at work making them the most at risk group of workers – at 9.6% their risk is eight times the average of 1.2%.
Health care professionals and health and social care specialists had higher than average risk at 3.1% and 3.4% respectively and have consistently had higher than average risk rates over the last number of years.
Other professions with higher risk include transport and mobile machine drivers at 3.0%. Surveys by trade unions show that many other groups of workers are at risk of experiencing work-related violence.