2 Police recorded hate crime
2.1 PREVALENCE AND TRENDS
There were 62,518 hate crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales in 2015/16, an increase
of 19 per cent compared with 2014/15 (52,465 offences; see Table 2).
Table 2: Hate crimes recorded by the police by monitored strand, 2011/12 to 2015/16
Numb ers and percentages
Hate crime strand
England and Wales, recorded crime
% change
2014/15 to
2013/14
2014/15
2015/16
2015/16
2011/12
2012/13
35,944
35,845
37,575
42,862
49,419
15
Religion
1,618
1,572
2,264
3,293
4,400
34
Sexual orientation
4,345
4,241
4,588
5,591
7,194
29
Disability
1,748
1,911
2,020
2,515
3,629
44
313
364
559
607
858
41
Total number of motivating factors
43,968
43,933
47,006
54,868
65,500
19
Total number of offences
N/A
42,255
44,577
52,465
62,518
19
Race
Transgender
Source: Police recorded crime, Home Office.
See Bulletin Table 2 for detailed footnotes.
Table 2 also shows the number of hate crimes broken down by monitored strand. It is possible for a
crime to have more than one motivating factor (for example an offence may be motivated by hostility
towards the victim’s race and religion). Thus, as well as recording the overall number of hate crimes,
the police also collect data on the number of motivating factors by strand as shown in Table 2. For this
reason, the sum of the five motivating factors in the above exceed the 62,518 offences (and the
percentages exceed 100%).
The number of hate crime offences in 2015/16 for the five centrally monitored strands were as follows:
49,419 (79%) were race hate crimes;
7,194 (12%) were sexual orientation hate crimes;
4,400 (7%) were religious hate crimes;
3,629 (6%) were disability hate crimes; and
858 (1%) were transgender hate crimes.
There were increases in all five of the centrally monitored strands between 2014/15 and 2015/16
(Table 2) and there has been an upward trend in all strands of hate crime since 2012/13.
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