ECRI Report, (Fifth monitoring cycle). Published on 4 October 2016
Country
United Kingdom
Year
Type of publication
Geographical coverage
National
Area/location of interest
Type of Institution
Council of Europe body
Institution
Main Thematic Focus
Racism & xenophobia Discrimination Ethnic profiling
Target Population
Muslims Migrants Ethnic minorities People with migrant background Refugees & asylum seekers
Key findings
The United Kingdom has still not signed and ratified Protocol No. 12 and the authorities have indicated that there are no plans to do so.
According to the Home Office13, there were 52 528 hate motivated criminal offences recorded by the police in the year 2014-2015. These include offences of hate speech and violence. Of note, 42 930 (82%) belonged to the category of race hate crime; 5 597 (11%) were sexual orientation hate crimes; 3 254 (6%) were religious hate crimes; and 605 (1%) were transgender hate crimes. There was an overall increase of 18% compared with 2013-14; the largest increase was in relation to religious hate crime (43%).
ECRI calls upon all political parties to take a firm stand against intolerant discourse and instruct their representatives to refrain from making derogatory comments targeting a group of persons on grounds of their “race”, religion, citizenship, language, ethnic origin, sexual orientation or gender identity.
Methodology (Qualitative/Quantitative and exact type used, questionnaires etc)
The working methods for the preparation of the reports involve documentary analyses, a visit to the country concerned, and then a confidential dialogue with the national authorities.
Sample details and representativeness
ECRI’s reports are analyses based on a great deal of information gathered from a wide variety of sources.