| Summary: | The Offending, Crime and Justice Survey (OCJS) (also sometimes known as the Crime and Justice Survey), was the first national longitudinal, self-report offending survey for England and Wales. The series began in 2003, the initial survey representing the first wave in a planned four-year rotating panel study, and ended with the 2006 wave. A longitudinal dataset based on the four years of the study was released in 2009 (held at the Archive under SN 6345). The OCJS was commissioned by the Home Office, with the overall objective of providing a solid base for measuring the prevalence of offending and drug use in the general population of England and Wales. The survey was developed in response to a significant gap in data on offending in the general population, as opposed to particular groups such as convicted offenders. A specific aim of the series was to monitor trends in offending among young people. The OCJS series was designed as a 'rotating panel' which means that in each subsequent year, part of the previous year's sample was re-interviewed, and was augmented by a further 'fresh' sample to ensure a cross-sectional representative sample of young people. The aim of this design was to fulfil two objectives: firstly, to provide a solid cross-sectional base from which to monitor year-on-year measures of offending, drug use, and contact with the CJS over the four-year tracking period (2003-2006); and secondly, to provide longitudinal insight into individual behaviour and attitudinal changes over time, and to enable the Home Office to identify temporal links between and within the key survey measures. The OCJS was managed by a team of researchers in the Home Office Research, Development and Statistics Directorate. The Home Office commissioned BMRB Social Research and the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen) to conduct the surveys jointly. Both organisations were involved in developing the surveys and, at each wave, the fieldwork was split between the two agencies. OCJS 2005: In 2005 the 'panel' sample included all respondents who had been previously interviewed and had agreed to be re-contacted. In addition to this, panel respondents from 2003, who were not interviewed in 2004 (due to being 'non contacts' or 'soft refusals') were also included. The intention in 2005 (as in 2004) was to achieve an overall sample (panel and 'fresh') of 5,000 young people. To achieve this, 423 'fresh' respondents were needed, but in fact 817 interviews were achieved, bringing the total sample up to 5,238. The OCJS 2005 aimed to provide, as in previous years: measures of self-reported offending; indicators of repeat offending; trends in the prevalence of offending; trends in the prevalence and frequency of drug and alcohol use; evidence on the links between offending and drug/alcohol use; evidence on the risk factors related to offending and drug use; information on the nature of offences committed, such as the role of co-offenders and the relationship between perpetrators and victims. In order to ensure comparability between survey years, much of the 2005 questionnaire remained the same as that for 2004. However, some questions were dropped to make room for new questions relating to new areas of policy interest. In addition, a small number of existing questions were reworded where this represented a necessary improvement on the original version. See documentation for further details. For the third edition (December 2008), the variable PFA (police force area) has been supplied for the main file. This variable was previously unavailable.
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