HC Deb 18 July 1967 vol 750 c240W
Mr. Whitaker

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department what has been the average annual rate of murders, in proportion to total population, before and since the abolition of the death penalty.

Mr. Roy Jenkins

In the five calendar years preceding 1965, the year in which the Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act, 1965, came into force, the latest corrected figures of murders known to the police in England and Wales averaged 3.0 per million of the home population. The latest corrected figure for 1966 also represented 3.0 per million of the home population.