Mencap, the learning disability charity, is calling for children to be made more aware of disabilities from a young age in order to tackle a surge in convictions for hate crime.
The call comes as the UK has learned that convictions for disability hate crime have soared by 40.6 per cent over the past year. This represents a rise from 503 in 2014/15 to 707 last year.
Dan Scorer: “Everyone working in the criminal justice system must take disability hate crime seriously and apply the full strength of the law”
The higher conviction rate was achieved from an increase of 9.5% in the number of disability hate crime cases that the police referred to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS). This represented a rise from 849 cases in 2014/15 to 930 in 2015/16.
Evidence of hostility
Dan Scorer, head of policy at Mencap, said that while the increase in prosecutions was welcome news, the ongoing level of hate crime against disabled people “is clear evidence of the levels of hostility and negative attitudes that people have to face”.
He said children must be taught from an early age to “respect and value all their peers and understand why it is unacceptable to victimise someone because of their disability”.
Scorer said that greater awareness of disability among the public would help to tackle negative attitudes towards the 1.4 million people with a learning disability living in the UK.
Hate crime under-reported, unidentified, uncharged
Hate crimes against disabled people had been under-reported, he said. They had also frequently not been identified or not charged appropriately by police, so that perpetrators were not being brought to justice.
Shockingly, prosecution rates have been as low as 1% in recent years, giving disabled people little confidence that reporting hate crime would lead to action being taken.
Scorer said: “For too long the bullying, intimidation and harassment of disabled people has not been treated as seriously as crimes against other minority groups.”
He called for tough action: “Everyone working in the criminal justice system must take disability hate crime seriously and apply the full strength of the law.”
Published: 14 July 2016
