Official figures show there have been just 89 moped enabled crimes in Barking and Dagenham so far this year, raising questions about the reporting and recording of these types of crime.

This is compared to more than 4,000 and 3,000 reports in Camden and Islington respectively, with the average borough in London recording 533 such crimes.

Residents and campaigners against moped crime have responded incredulously to the figures, saying they don’t reflect the extent of the problem in the borough.

The Post has had a surge in reports of moped incidents this year and has published a string of stories on the subject.

Jimmy Mac, admin of a non-vigilante Facebook page which compiles a list of the borough’s moped incidents, said he is aware of more than 89 incidents.

“It is definitely way off,” he said.

“Some people phone up to report a crime and they wait so long for an officer to come out, so of course these things aren’t being reported and they are not being recorded,” he said.

Met figures show during some months of this year, little over half of call-outs were responded to within the target response time of 15 minutes.

However the police were this week given a boost in the battle against moped crime when Met commissioner Cressida Dick confirmed to London Assembly member Unmesh Desai when pressed that there is “no such thing” as the no pursuit policy.

However she acknowledged senior officers in the control room regularly call an end to pursuits they feel are too dangerous and made no mention of the tactic supposedly used by suspects whereby they remove their helmets to stop a chase.

Superintendent Mark Payne of the Met Police said: “The figure of 89 would refer to allegations of crime during which a moped was used by the suspects. If no crime had occurred then this may be recorded as an anti-social behaviour incident.

“Additionally, the same incident may have been reported or mentioned on Facebook several times which created the impression of multiple incidents.

“I am afraid we cannot speculate on whether these crimes are under reported. We can only deal with issues reported to us.”