CPS and Disability Hate Crime

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bone. I thank the hon. Member for Bootle (Peter Dowd) for securing the debate. This is one of those special debates where it is easy to find broad consensus, which we should always cherish when we find it.

In the past year, the Crown Prosecution Service has prosecuted 15,442 hate crimes in England. That is a 4% rise on the previous year, which also saw a rise of 4.7%. Campaigners are convinced that those prosecutions are the tip of the iceberg and that the true scale of the problem is much greater. Many cases go unreported, as the hon. Members for Bootle and for Strangford (Jim Shannon) have pointed out in some detail. Indeed, the Disability Hate Crime Network believes that there are 60,000 hate crimes against disabled people every year, and the hon. Member for Strangford set out that case in some detail.

The Disability Hate Crime Network fears that disabled people lack confidence that they will be listened to, and we must recognise that there is some real hostility towards disabled people. Figures published by The Independent last year suggest that that hostility is real and growing, and it is often facilitated by our online digital world, as the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper) said.

Under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, disabled people now have the same legal rights as everyone else following high-profile campaigning by disabled people themselves. It is shameful to think that, before that legislation was enacted, a disabled person could be legally turned away from a restaurant, prevented from using public transport, fired from their job for being ill or even isolated from society behind the walls of their own home. Changing the law to protect people was important to our society because it said that discrimination against disabled people—indeed, against any people—is simply not acceptable but, as we have heard today, there is some evidence that attitudes towards disabled people are hardening. The hon. Member for Strangford gave us some examples of that.

More needs to be done to address the pervasive, low-level negativity towards disabled people that provides the perfect conditions for hostility and hate crime to thrive. Scope, the disability rights charity, says that 42% of non-disabled people do not know a disabled person so, as the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean said, education is important.

Police investigations of such cases have improved since the tragic death of Fiona Pilkington, who killed herself and her disabled daughter in 2013 following years of bullying and abuse—that bullying and abuse was ignored at the time by the police. Her Majesty’s Crown Prosecution Service inspectorate has indicated that the police still need to do more to address such abuse, which is suffered by too many disabled people on a regular basis.

The CPS completed 941 disabled hate crime prosecutions in 2015-16, compared with 666 in the previous year, and convictions increased by 40%. It has publicly said that it wants to push up the rates of prosecution and conviction for such crimes, sending out a message that those crimes will be treated extremely seriously, but an understanding of hate crime needs to be developed among prosecutors, as the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie) said.

As the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean said, progress is being made—we are capturing more of these crimes—but we still have a long way to go. Hate crime is a crime committed against a person or property that is motivated by

“malice or ill-will towards an identifiable social group”.

The Scottish Government have invested more than £100 million in promoting equality and addressing discrimination. A refreshed and strengthened disability action plan will be published later this year specifically to raise awareness of disability hate crime.

The environment in which we operate matters. Although we know that disability hate crime is underreported, we also know that more victims are finding the strength, the facilities and the support to come forward. That is enough to tell us that we have a duty to continue raising awareness about this issue so that even more victims feel able to come forward with confidence that they will be listened to, and that such crime is simply not acceptable in our society.

We must also build strong, supportive, cohesive communities where people can live in peace. Work has been undertaken in a practical sense, with Police Scotland visiting schools and communities to raise awareness and educate groups of all ages about disability hate crime. I mention those examples because we all could and should study good practice in one part of the UK to see how it can be deployed in other parts. I have said that in just about every single debate in which I have participated in this place, and today I find myself in the esteemed position of echoing the words of the hon. Member for Strangford.

Despite the hate crime action plan published by the UK Government, I feel compelled to point out that the ideologically driven austerity agenda, which is perceived as targeting disabled people, has helped to encourage toxic rhetoric about the most vulnerable in our society. That apparent targeting of disabled people is not necessarily deliberate, but it is enough that it is thoughtless and insensitive. When some social security powers are devolved to Scotland, we will base our system on dignity and respect—new employment support programmes for disabled people will begin to be delivered in Scotland from April 2017.

When our society is marred by prejudice and hatred towards those with disabilities, we all agree that we must react. We cannot and must not underestimate the impact of such crimes on individuals and their families. Such crimes leave disabled people and their families feeling isolated, intimidated and rejected. We must continue to reinforce a zero-tolerance attitude to such crimes and towards those who engage in them. That is why I am so proud that the Scottish Government are further promoting their Keep Safe initiative, which works with local businesses to create Keep Safe spaces for disabled and vulnerable people. I note with interest the comments of the hon. Member for Bootle, who spoke about how some disabled people feel that it is not even safe to leave their home.

I would like to hear the Solicitor General speak today about what further we can do to work together across the United Kingdom to ensure that all in our society are given the respect and dignity they need and deserve. As we have heard today, we clearly cannot take tolerance for granted.