West Midlands with highest gun rate in the country

There was 540 firearm offences dealt with by West Midlands Police last year - a rise of 41 incidents meaning there is now a higher gun crime rate across the Black Country and Birmingham than London.

The West Midlands now has a rate of 19.4 – making it the highest of anywhere in England and Wales with one in nine incidents of gun crime in England and Wales took place in the force area last year.

But figures have nearly halved in the West Midlands since 2007/08 when there were 974 incidents.

Deputy Chief Constable Dave Thompson, ACPO lead for Criminal Use of Firearms, said: "This is encouraging news and we will continue to tackle gun crime in our communities.

"The firearms surrenders carried out by police forces last year helped to remove thousands of guns from circulation; weapons which could have fallen into the hands of criminals.

"I want to reassure the public that there is a lot of hard work going on to remove the threat of firearms in our towns and cities and we will continue to try and prevent crime as well as lock up offenders."

London's previous figure of nearly 2,000 incidents has dropped by nearly 400 from 23.6 incidents per 100,000 to 18.9 incidents per 100,000 people.

Greater Manchester and Merseyside also have lower gun crime rates than the West Midlands at 14.6 and 15.3 per 100,000 respectively.

The Staffordshire and Shropshire have two of the lowest rates in the country with Staffordshire and West Mercia Police reporting 41 and 42 firearms incidents each - a rate of four and three gun crimes per 100,000 people.

Nationally there was 4,801 gun crimes - a five per cent drop in the past 12 months.

In Staffordshire there was 123 gun crimes in 2007/08 and 128 in West Mercia in the same year.

The West Midlands also had the third highest knife crime rate after London and Greater Manchester.

Senior officers said gun crime makes up 0.2 per cent of overall crime.

The number of offences involving firearms has been falling year-on-year since its peak in 2003/04 when 24,094 offences were recorded. The latest figure of 7,714 offences represents a fall of more than two-thirds (68 per cent) since then.

NABIS, the National Ballistics Intelligence Service, work with police forces across the UK to analyse ballistic material and build up a picture of the threat of gun crime.

Detective Chief Superintendent Jo Chilton,head of the unit, said: "The decrease in gun crime is good news.

"However NABIS will not be complacent on this issue, we will continue to work with forces and law enforcement agencies to reduce the risk posed from firearms to our communities."

Nationally, there were 29 fatalities resulting from offences involving firearms in 2013/14; one fewer than the previous year and the lowest figure since 1980. People aged between 15 and 34 also made up a disproportionate number of those of seriously or fatally injured from offences involving firearms with78 per cent of the total, while making up just 26 per cent of the population as a whole.