LONDON (Reuters) - Crime
committed by girls has increased by more than a quarter over the past
three years, government figures revealed on Thursday. 

The Youth Justice Board (YJB),
which oversees juvenile offenders in England and Wales, said it has
commissioned a study to investigate the reasons. 

Commentators ascribed the
increase partly to a rise in the total number of girls aged under 17
and partly to the police being more willing to take action against girls
accused of crimes such as school fights. 

Boys still commit most youth
crime but the YJB said offences by males fell two percent over the same
period. 

The YJB figures came as the
government announced that the opinions of children aged under 16 would
be for the first time included in its British Crime Survey (BCS). 

A separate study also revealed
on Thursday that one in eight young people aged 11-16 were victims of
"hot pocket theft" of electronic items including MP3 players,
iPods and mobile phones. 

The government said it wants
to highlight the link between street robbery and young people carrying
valuable equipment. 

In its annual Workload Data
research, the YJB reported that since 2006 young females -- some as
young as 10 -- committed almost 60,000 crimes including theft, criminal
damage, violent attacks, criminal damage and public order crimes. 

This was a 25 percent increase
from 2003/2004, when more than 47,000 offences by girls were committed. 

The number of crimes by boys
fell to 236,000 over the same period, compared with 240,000 three years
earlier. 

Overall offences increased
from almost 288,000 in 2003/04 to more than 301,800 over 2005/06.  Last
year they fell again to more than 295,000. 

The figures cover offences
that brought criminal charges, a fixed-penalty notice, a police caution,
or a formal warning. 

Research from the Design
Council meanwhile, revealed that one in three of the young "hot
product" victims were listening to music on headphones, talking,
texting or playing on a games console when their property was snatched. 

The study was unveiled by
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith who also announced the new crime survey
guidelines. 

She said while it would mean
a spike in the amount of crimes reported, involving young people in
the BCS would provide a better understanding of how crime affected them. 

"I want to ensure that
young people are offered as much protection from crime as possible,
and receive support if they do become victims, whilst also tackling
offending vigorously," she said in a statement. 

Shadow Home Secretary, David
Davis, welcomed the new BCS measures but added in a statement: "The
government's reliance on the BCS measure has ignored crimes against
children for years, despite a steep rise in youth violence."