Question to the Attorney General:

To ask the Attorney General, how many women have been charged with assault by penetration since 2012 up to the most recent year for which data is available.

The total number of section 2 Sexual Offences Act 2003 (assault by penetration) offences charged against male and female defendants which reached a first hearing at the magistrates’ courts in England and Wales across the previous five financial years was as follows:

Whilst defendant gender data is not recorded by the CPS in relation to the specific offence of assault by penetration, it does hold data in relation to the broader offence category of ‘sexual offences excluding rape’, which includes those offences.

Of the 13,490 defendants prosecuted for sexual offences excluding rape in 2016-17, 13,022 defendants were male, 432 were female and the gender was not recorded for 36 defendants.