Offenses ranging from excessive intoxication to violent behavior are on the rise in nearly every police jurisdiction in England and Wales since new laws allowed pubs and clubs to maintain long hours, the Sunday Telegraph reported Aug. 10.

Public order offenses, half of which police attribute to excessive drinking, are up 136 percent from four years ago, when the laws permitting longer serving hours went into effect. Basing its report on data collected from over 80 percent of all police forces in England and Wales, the newspaper said that through April of this year 161,431 "Penalty Notices for Disorder" were handed out. In 2004-2005, the last year before public establishments became eligible for 24-hour licenses, only 68,342 such notices were given.

"What 24-hour licensing has done is to give us more problems at three, four and five in the morning," said Mike Craik, Chief Constable of the Northumbria Police. He added, "It is drinking that is driving the levels of penalty notices up."

The government has also noted a 25 percent rise in serious violent crimes between 3am and 6am, in addition to the spike in public order offenses such as damaging property, urinating in the street, or yelling abusive remarks to passers-by.

The deputy chief constable of the British Transport Police, Andy Trotter, said "The new laws may have brought an end to the 11pm rush but the downside is that police forces now have to deploy large numbers of officers through the night - sometimes to deal with extremely violent incidents - which means fewer resources are available for normal policing during the day."