There were 180 registered sex offenders living in north-east Hampshire last year, a fall of 9%, according to a new report.

The unusual fall has been attributed to the ten-year lapse since the introduction of the sex offender’s register, when sex offenders and paedophiles were enlisted en masse to the list.

As many sex offenders were initially placed on the list for a 10 year period, a significant number have now been allowed to drop off the list and are now living without supervision by the authorities. In Hampshire as a whole, the number of registered sex offenders fell by 3% to 1,155 last year. The figure means that there were 65 sex offenders per 100,000 people in the county.

The number of sex offenders in Category Three, considered the greatest risk to the public and are liable to police surveillance and being held in special hostels, halved between 2006-07 and 2007-08 from 18 to just nine individuals.

Meanwhile the proportion of sex offenders in Category One, considered the lowest risk to the public, increased over the same period to 910 (79% of the total), compared to 867 the previous year (73% of the 2006-07 total).

The figures were released as part of a report on the arrangements to deal with potentially dangerous or violent criminals who have been released from prison in Hampshire.

The report is the seventh annual review of Mappa (Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements) in the county after its introduction in 2000.

The fall bucks the national trend, where the number of sex offenders in England and Wales went up by 3% to 31,300.

The 180 sex offenders registered at addresses in the Rushmoor, Hart, Basingstoke and East Hampshire districts are among 1,899 potentially dangerous criminals who were supervised by the probation service and other agencies in Hampshire last year, a fall of 2%.