the latter to an historically low level.

Let's see how different newspapers report this story:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8472007.stm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/jan/21/police-figures-unexpected-drop-crime
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1244947/Crime-rate-falls-8-cent-despite-recession.html (some of the comments underneath this are amazing too)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/lawandorder/7043102/Crime-programme-funding-cut-leaked-letter-shows.html

Hmm... interesting...