04/07/2007
Legislation - Hate crime
Research shows that LGBT people are at much higher risk of harassment and attack, with over half reporting harassment, and more than one quarter reporting physical assault, in one year. Scotland is the only part of the UK where crimes that are motivated by homophobic hatred are not treated as aggravated crimes.
The Scottish Executive’s Hate Crime Working Group recommended extending the current statutory aggravation of racial or religious hate, to cover hate crimes on grounds of sexual orientation and transgender identity, and on grounds of disability.
This would enable homophobic, transphobic and disability-related hate crimes to be recognised, handled, prosecuted and sentenced as hate crime, just as racist and religious or sectarian crimes are.
- The Scottish Parliament should legislate to extend the statutory aggravation for racist and religious hate crime to cover homophobic, transphobic and disability-related hate crime.
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