No, not on the recorded numbers, and the gap is not a rounding error. Liskeard's crime rate runs about half again above the Cornwall average. Everything else about the town is cheap, green and quietly functional. This is the part of the case that will not argue back. Anyone moving here should price it in rather than discover it.
Police.uk recorded about 114 crimes per thousand people across the area in the twelve months to May 2026, from 1,438 recorded offences. That sits roughly 53% above the local-authority average. Both figures are published rates using the police's own statistical-area populations rather than the resident headcount, so they are comparable with each other and not with a sum you do on the back of an envelope.
The comparison is worth seeing in full rather than as a percentage. Cornwall as a whole recorded about 74 crimes per thousand people over the same period. Liskeard recorded about 114. That is the difference between a county with a low rate and a market town carrying considerably more than its share of it.
Some of the texture behind that is what a town is. The area averages around 3,434 people per square kilometre across its neighbourhoods, which is town density rather than village density, and a town is where the pubs, the shops, the bus stops and the car parks all are. Unemployment sits at about 3% and overcrowded households at about 2%, both low. Those are descriptions of the place, not explanations of the crime figure, and anyone offering you a tidy causal story about a rate like this is selling something.
The mix matters more than the headline, and it needs reading carefully. Violence and sexual offences make up about 44% of recorded crime here against about 35% nationally. That category is broad by statute, covering common assault without injury alongside far more serious offences, and it is the largest category almost everywhere in England and Wales, so the bare share is less alarming than it looks and the gap above the national share is the part worth noting. Criminal damage and arson run at about 11% locally against about 7% nationally. Anti-social behaviour is about 13% here against about 16% nationally, so slightly below. Shoplifting at about 7% against about 8%, other theft at about 7% against about 7%, and public order at about 6% against about 7% are all close enough to the national picture to be unremarkable.
Then there is the question people actually ask after a break-in, which is whether anyone gets caught. Devon and Cornwall Police charged a suspect in about 8% of cases over the same twelve months, against about 12% nationally, and the force ranks 42nd of 42 forces on that measure. About 26% of cases closed with no suspect identified at all. That is a force-wide figure covering the whole of Devon and Cornwall rather than anything specific to Liskeard, and it answers a different question from the crime rate. A low charge rate does not make a place more dangerous. It does tell you what to expect from the process afterwards, which is worth knowing before you find out the hard way.
Safety is this town's weakest dimension by a clear margin, and the recorded numbers do not support any softer reading. That does not make Liskeard a bad place to live, but it does mean anyone buying here should look at the specific street and the specific evening rather than trusting the general Cornish assumption that rural equals quiet.