Hate Crime and Housing Providers Workshop

This three-hour workshop will help you and your organisation to provide an evidence-based approach to understanding hate crime, challenging it, and supporting victims.

The workshop will be led by Kusminder Chahal, Director of Training Services with Stop Hate UK, Senior Research Fellow with Birmingham City University and a HDN Associate.

What the workshop will cover

• What is hate crime and current developments.

• The extent, nature, and impact of hate crime.
• Hate crime triggers.
• Barriers and pathways to reporting.
• Supporting hate crime victims.
• Peer support and sharing best practice.

Delegates will receive relevant information and a list of resources

Background

The 2020/21 police recorded crime figures show that there were 114,958 offences where one or more of the centrally monitored hate crime strands were deemed to be a motivating factor. This represented a 9% increase on figures for 2019/20. The increase in police recorded hate crime over time has partly been attributed to better recording methods used and greater awareness in reporting hate crimes. Since April 2015, there have been spikes for racially or religiously aggravated hate crime at the time of the EU referendum, 2017 terrorist attacks and 2020 Black Lives Matters protests and during covid-19 there has been an increase in targeted hate against Chinese and South East Asian groups.

Hate crime continues to be widely misunderstood, often being subsumed within anti-social behaviour, despite it having a more significant impact on its victims than non-hate motivated offences. Under-reporting is still a cause for concern and how service providers respond to allegations of hate crime, provide support, and undertake casework can make a huge difference in the well-being of victims, communities and fostering good relations in wider society.

Is hate crime an issue for housing providers?

Social housing tenants are four times more likely than owner-occupiers to be victims of hate crime. Social housing providers have significant local influence, involvement in multi-agency partnerships and a legal obligation to respond to hate incidents and crime.