From Safer Communities and Justice Statistics Monthly Data Report: March 2026 published today, the above and :

Number of victims of homicide at the lowest level since 1976. There were 45 homicide victims recorded by the police in Scotland in 2024-25, a 21% decrease from 2023-24 and a 24% decrease from 2015-16. https://www.gov.scot/publications/safer-communities-and-justice-statistics-monthly-data-report-march-2026/pages/statistics-on-crime-in-general/

In the year ending March 2025, there were 522 victims of homicide in England and Wales – https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/articles/homicideinenglandandwales/yearendingmarch2025

All things being equal, with 11 times the population, you’d expect there to have been around 495 homicides in England and Wales but there were 522, 5.4% more.

Remember, only 20 years ago Scotland was the murder capital of Europe. Now it is lower than Denmark and Sweden.

Had the trend gone the other way you know who’d be blamed so, as it has not, the SNP gets the credit?