CRIME and antisocial behaviour on buses in Hounslow is up by nearly 10 per cent according to the latest figures.
There were 149 offences recorded in the borough between July and September, compared with 136 during the same period last year.
The rise comes as bus crime across the capital fell by 15.1 per cent, Transport for London's (TfL) quarterly report reveals.
However, transport chiefs played down the increase in Hounslow, pointing out that bus-related crime in the borough had fallen by 27.1 per cent since 2007/8 and there were just 9.3 offences per million passengers in the first half of 2011/12.
Crime is also down by 8.6 per cent when comparing the year-to-date figures with those for the same six-month period last year.
Steve Burton, director of TfL's community safety enforcement policing, said: "The transport network is a low-crime environment and we are continuing to drive down crime, with the number of offences at their lowest level for seven years.
"We are not complacent and TfL takes these issues extremely seriously and has measures in place to deal with them, including targeted police operations, CCTV to bring offenders to justice and crime prevention activities.
"TfL and its partners are undertaking proactive measures to deal with this and over the next six months we will complete the deployment of an additional 413 warranted police officers on the transport network."
