Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to reduce the number of disability hate crimes.

The Government takes all forms of hate crime very seriously. Crime that is motivated by hostility or hatred towards the victim is particularly corrosive and can have devastating consequences for victims and their families. In 2012, the previous Government published a hate crime action plan and a total of 13 actions were dedicated to the prevention of disability hate crime, including the creation of a new cross government Disability Strategy, the publication of the Crown Prosecution Service Action Plan on disability hate crime and publishing examples of good practice by disabled persons’ user-led organisations. The progress report on the action plan, published in 2014, showed that we had either completed or made good progress on all actions.

The number of police-recorded hate crimes against disabled people has increased each year since records began in 2011. There were 1,753 reports in 2011/2012, 1,843 in 2012/2013 and 1,985 in 2013/2014. This could indicate that there is an increased understanding of disability hate crime by police and victims.

The Government is currently speaking to a number of organisations and individuals to inform the next steps in our strategy to tackle disability hate crime. This includes work with the Fulfilling Potential Forum, which is led by the Office for Disability Issues within DWP and is made up of around 40 disability charities, including disabled people’s user led organisations.