It’s important that police should be making full use of all the available technology to plot and map crime.

They need such statistics to know what happens where and how often, so they can deploy their resources in the most efficient manner.

The public also have a right to know what’s happening close to where they live and work so they can monitor how cleverly and effectively crime is being tackled.

But the accuracy of conclusions to be drawn from any collection of data will always only be as accurate as the definitions and the labels attached to it.

Unfortunately, we have already seen glitches in the system.

Nationally, for example, it has been pointed out that hoaxes have been included as incidents so a neighbourhood could look as if it has a lot of problems with burglaries merely because some hoaxer has been making phone calls.

In the Ribble Valley, police have explained that in one part of rural Longridge, for example, there appears to be significant ‘anti-social behaviour’.

But there are not crowds of yobs causing trouble.

It’s simply that when sheep stray on to roads, it is logged as anti-social behaviour!

So while the exercise is potentially useful, further investigation should be made before sensible conclusions can be safely drawn.