GREATER Manchester Police fails to record more than 38,000 crimes each year — including violent and sexual offences, it has been revealed.

The HM Inspectorate of Constabulary has rated GMP as inadequate at recording crime after assessing the force earlier this year.

HMIC, which completed its inspection in May, said that the Greater Manchester force is currently under-recording too many reports of crime — including reports of rape, violent crimes and sexual offences.

Shockingly, it said staff have also been incorrectly cancelling recorded sexual offences and offences of robbery and violence.

In a damning assessment, the inspectorate said that GMP has ‘limited supervision to support officers and staff in making good and prompt crime-recording decisions’ and found there to be a ‘lack of understanding’ by officers and staff of their responsibilities for crime-recording.

HM Inspector of Constabulary Dru Sharpling said: “Despite making some progress following our 2014 inspection, the force is failing some victims of crime.

“We estimate that the force fails to record over 38,000 reported crimes each year.

“The reported crimes that go unrecorded include serious crimes, such as violence and sexual offences.”

He added: “The failings are often a consequence of a lack of knowledge on the part of the officers and staff as to their responsibilities for crime-recording; including the cancellation of recorded crime records.

“I expect the force to make progress against the areas for improvement we identified in this report and I will monitor this progress.”

HMIC did find that GMP records around 85 per cent of crimes reported — up from 68 per cent in 2014.

It said the force had made some progress in ‘placing the victim at the forefront of their crime-recording decisions’ and has made ‘good progress against a national action plan developed to improve crime-recording.’

One way GMP is seeking to improve its statistics is with the introduction of a new IT system that will allow officers to record crime at the first contact.

Deputy chief constable Ian Pilling said: “When the victim rings us to report a crime, it will automatically be recorded. This is a major step forward and should be in place within the next 12 months.”

He added: “Reviewing the way crime is recorded is important but it is the service that victims get that is the priority.

“Many victims of crime are satisfied with the service they receive, even when the crime is not recorded properly and the report doesn’t highlight this.

“While there are some unacceptable crime recording failings, many are simply administrative issues and do not mean we have failed the victim.”

“A significant amount of activity has taken place to address these administrative problems and we will continue to work hard to address this. It is important to recognise that there is nothing in the report to suggest that the integrity of officers and staff is in question.”

Police and Crime Commissioner Tony Lloyd agreed that the planned new IT system will improve the situation and will monitor the situation.

He said: “It is vital that police record crime properly, and it is right that GMP’s performance in this area is rigorously scrutinised, so I welcome this inspection report.

“It highlights the significant improvements that have been made in recording crime – the recording rate now sits at more than 85%, up from 68% in 2014 but clearly GMP’s crime recording processes are still not good enough.

“The people of Greater Manchester will – quite rightly – not accept any part of their police service to be inadequate, so I have told the chief constable I expect the recommendations to be implemented swiftly and will be monitoring progress.

He added: “The major investment I am making into the service’s IT infrastructure will resolve these technical issues, which will lead to significant improvements.”