Reality and perception of insecurity in Barcelona

The question was clear and direct: "Is Barcelona a safe city?" The answer is already another matter.

Oliver Thansan
Oliver Thansan
14 March 2023 Tuesday 01:40
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Reality and perception of insecurity in Barcelona

The question was clear and direct: "Is Barcelona a safe city?" The answer is already another matter. And it is that the statistics say one thing and perception usually says another, as was made clear yesterday at the Círculo Ecuestre in Barcelona. Among the audience, who had not been robbed at home –one or more times–, they had been robbed on the street. And then, the ordeal of the complaint, due to the "endless waits that make you give up," said an assistant, "that's why I don't believe the statistics."

"It is a courageous subject and one that worries us all a lot," warned the president of the entity, Antonio Delgado by way of welcome. Enrique Lacalle, vice president of the Círculo, gave way to the colloquium but not before insisting that "the general feeling is that Barcelona is not safe and that detainees enter through one door and leave through the other." Marta Fernández, commissioner of the Mossos d'Esquadra, picked up the glove: “Unquestionably Barcelona is safe” and she endorsed her forcefulness with figures: 49% of reported crimes are thefts; Last year, overall crime fell 14% compared to 2019 and there were eleven homicides, 40% less than in 2019. Fernández acknowledged low-intensity insecurity: “Of every hundred robberies, five are violent and intimidating: but if we let ourselves be carried away by images or by social networks we can think otherwise...".

The Mayor of the Urban Police, Pedro Velázquez, endorsed the "yes it is safe" from the Mossos police station, insisting on the breadth of the concept of security, "increasingly oriented towards the perception of the response to criminal acts" and putting the problem of multiple recidivism, drugs and citizen conflicts on the table, “that is why communication and coordination between the police forces – which yesterday they all happily endorsed – and also the collaboration of the citizenry are so important”.

Maria José Ortega, National Police station, explained that "a very strong investment has been made in issues related to immigration to manage the issue of irregular repeat offenders." And following the thread, Luis Sans, in his double role as partner of the entity and president of the Association of Paseo Gracia, congratulated the security forces for their "great work" while lamenting that "24.9% of citizens claim to have been victims of crimes or attempts, something is being done wrong”. He also lamented that "only 9% of thieves enter pretrial detention and while 91% are still on the streets and it takes between ten months, hopefully, and fourteen for them to go to trial... A pact must be promoted to provide the courts with financial and human resources”.

"A politician has told me that it's my fault for going with a Cartier at night, that I no longer wear it, but this is not the answer," said one of the attendees at the colloquium. "I think there are many more petty thefts that go unreported because you have to wait hours at the police stations to be seen," said another, outraged.

The moderator of the colloquium, the specialist in events from La Vanguardia, Mayka Navarro, intervened, asking about the expectations. The Mayor of the Urban Guard cited the project in which they are working with the Mossos so that citizens can report indistinctly at any police station. Commissioner Marta Fernández acknowledged that in the case of the prior appointment "the process is taking too long, it takes three or four days and we are looking at how to shorten the deadlines, but in the face-to-face complaint the average wait is thirty minutes", to to which another assistant replied: "I was robbed and at the police station, as there were many people, they told me that I had better come back the next day."