Yes, and it is safe by a wide margin. Crime runs at a little over half the district's rate. Fewer than a hundred crimes were recorded in a whole year across the village. Hardly anyone here is out of work. A year of Fernhurst's crime would fit comfortably in a parish newsletter.
Police figures for the year from June 2025 to May 2026 put Fernhurst's crime rate at about 44 per 1,000 residents, roughly 45% below the local-authority average. Over those twelve months, 94 crimes were recorded in the area. That is the whole year's total for the village.
The Chichester district average over the same period was about 81 crimes per 1,000 residents, against Fernhurst's 44. The district includes a cathedral city with a nightlife and a shopping centre. Fernhurst has a crossroads, a green and a pub, and its crime figures look like it.
The average population density across the area is about 1,660 people per square kilometre. Unemployment is about 3%, and about 2% of households are overcrowded. These figures do not explain the crime rate on their own. They describe a settled place where most households have work and space, and where that shows up in the numbers.
What happens after a report is a separate question, and the answer there is less comfortable. Sussex Police charges a suspect in about 10% of cases, against about 12% nationally, and ranks 35th of 42 forces on that measure. Nearly half its cases, about 48%, are closed without a suspect being identified. Those figures cover the whole force and tell you nothing about crime levels in Fernhurst itself. They do tell you not to count on getting a stolen bike back. The same would be true almost anywhere, but the league-table position is not one the force will be quoting.
Safety is one of Fernhurst's real strengths. Crime is rare enough that the more reasonable worry is how slowly an occasional case gets resolved, not whether one will happen.