An Official Statistics publication for Scotland
A report on Hate Crime in Scotland 2019-20 was published today. This brings together figures on race crime, and on crime motivated by prejudice related to religion, disability, sexual orientation and transgender identity.
The main findings are
- There has been an increase in the number of charges reported in 2019-20 compared to 2018-19 for all categories of hate crime.
- Racial crime remains the most commonly reported hate crime. In total 3,038 charges relating to race crime were reported in 2019-20, an increase of 4 percent compared to 2018-19. Although the number of charges has increased in 2019-20, it is still the second lowest annual figure since consistent figures became available in 2003-04.
- Sexual orientation aggravated crime is the second most commonly reported type of hate crime. The number of charges reported increased by 24 percent in 2019-20 to 1,486. With the exception of 2014-15, there have been year on year increases in charges reported since the legislation introducing this aggravation came into force in 2010.
- There were 660 religiously aggravated charges reported in 2019-20, an increase of 24 percent compared to 2018-19. Direct comparisons are not possible with earlier years, but the number of charges reported with a religious aggravation in 2019-20 appears to be at around the same level as the number of charges containing a religious element in 2015-16, but lower than the level in 2016-17.
- The number of disability aggravated charges increased by 29 percent to 387 in 2019-20.
- There were 41 charges reported in 2019-20 with an aggravation of transgender identity, compared to 40 in 2018-19.
Additional Information:
- The figures quoted relate to the number of charges rather than the number of individuals charged or the number of incidents that gave rise to such charges. Where a charge has more than one hate crime aggravation, it is included in the overall figures for each type of hate crime into which it falls.
- The publication does not include information on convictions or conviction rates. Many of the charges reported in 2019-20 will not yet have reached conviction stage. The Scottish Government Criminal Proceedings database is the usual source for convictions data, and they have published figures for years up to 2018-19 on people with a main charge proved with an aggravator recorded - see tables 12 and 13 at https://www.gov.scot/publications/criminal-proceedings-scotland-2018-19/