We asked a range of people if they could prove disability hate crime exists and if so, if there is a need for a change in understanding regarding this...

The suggestion that there is such a thing as 'disability hate crime' has been brought to the fore by horrific cases like Steven Hoskin and Brent Martin who were tortured until death because their murderers hated their disabilities.

But are these an exception to the norm? Is this an opportunistic or hate motivated crime?

Kathryn Stone is Chief Executive of Voice UK :

“These crimes are born of hatred. When the crime has been committed and the person has gone away it changes the person who is the victim and simply in a civilised society we can not tolerate this level of hate crime being metered out against disabled people.”

The report 'Another Assault' by the charity MIND states that 71% of people with mental disabilities have felt victimised in their communities in last two years and that over half of these were dissatisfied with authorities' response to crime reports.

Mark Eaton from Disability Wessex thinks that there is a difference between hate and opportunism:

“I think any group is actually liable for targeting. However; older people, disabled people, people who can’t fight back, are more susceptible. I noticed the MIND figures you’ve got here, you have to bear in mind are just for people with mental health issues, people with physical disabilities I think are just as targeted.”

The United Kingdom Disabled Peoples Council were asked by the government to prove that there was such a thing as 'disability hate crime'. The government could then consider amending section 3A of the 1986 Public Order Act to make inciting hatred against disabled people a criminal offence.

We discussed this with their campaign worker Simone Aspis:

“Ministers wanted evidence to show inciting hatred by leaflets and lyrics, the difficulty around disability hate crime is that when disabled people are targeted they are not targeted as a group in such an organised, explicit way; inciting to hate is more verbal and targeted at individuals.”

With a lack of tangible evidence available, we asked our contributors how they thought the government and police should now move forward in regards to disability hate crime:

Kathryn Stone: “There needs to be some kind of cultural changes – and I’m going to be drawing parallels between the way that we have investigated and perceived race hate incidents and race hate crimes.”

Mark Eaton: “I think that people need to understand who to report, what to report and how to report…and accessibility; so text-phones for example would be a good one for people with hearing loss, visual impairments – an email address. But just open the accessibility to people who have specific needs.”

Simone Aspis: “Increasing the awareness that disability hate crime does exist. Campaigning for increased awareness amongst disabled people, the police and the criminal justice system.”