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 | You and Yours - Transcript BBC Radio 4 |
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| TX: 26.02.07 - Disabled crime victims PRESENTER: WINIFRED ROBINSON |
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| THE ATTACHED TRANSCRIPT WAS TYPED FROM A RECORDING AND NOT COPIED FROM AN ORIGINAL SCRIPT. BECAUSE OF THE RISK OF MISHEARING AND THE DIFFICULTY IN SOME CASES OF IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUAL SPEAKERS, THE BBC CANNOT VOUCH FOR ITS COMPLETE ACCURACY. ROBINSON Disability rights campaigners say that hate crimes against disabled people are one of the great hidden problems of our time. The Disability Rights Commission published research suggesting that one in five disabled people had been harassed in public because of their disability. As a result of lobbying the law was changed and courts must treat crimes as more serious where there's evidence that there was hostility towards a victim because that person is disabled. And now the Crime Prosecution Service has published a new Disability Hate Crime Policy. Elizabeth Howe is from the CPS. If the new law came into force in April 2005 why did it take you so long to draw up a new policy? HOWE Well it hasn't taken us very long. The act - the provision was actually part of a mammoth act - The Criminal Justice Act 2003 - it was one of over 300 provisions. And of course as soon as it's on the statute books, and it came in force in April 2005, it's available for use for all the criminal justice agencies. But we thought this was such an important provision that we decided that we would publish a policy on it, we don't publish policies on every single change in legislation - that would be impossible - because we thought that it was important to advertise this particular provision, to advertise it amongst the public and amongst those who might be affected by it but also within the criminal justice system itself, so that it would be used, there's no point in just having it on the statute books, it's got to be used in order to make an impact. This was also part of our disability action plan, to give disabled people equal access to justice. We started developing the policy early last year, it's taken us some time because we thought it was very important to consult with disabled groups and with disabled people in order to ensure that the policy spoke to those who are affected, had credibility and we're launching it, as you have said, tomorrow. ROBINSON Could you tell us briefly, if you would, because we have limited time, how has the law changed, what does it now say with regard to crime and disability? HOWE The particular provision in fact is a sentencing provision, it actually doesn't create a new offence. And what it says is that if we can show - and we have to have evidence of this - that there has been hostility towards a disabled person or a family of a disabled person, either a demonstration of hostility or a hostile intent, then that's an aggravating feature and the sentencing court must uplift the sentence when sentencing and tell the people that it in fact it has done that. ROBINSON Well it can be very difficult to know when hostility towards someone's disability has motivated a crime and Newnight's Kirsty Wark told our disability affairs correspondent, Carolyn Atkinson, about a recent attack on her brother Alan, who has mild learning difficulties. He was approached and robbed on a station platform. WARK My brother was travelling home from work, it was just quarter to six at night and the platform was deserted, when two youths - for want of a better word - thugs, probably, I'd call them, approached him asking for a cigarette, to which he replied he didn't smoke; asking for money, which he said he wasn't going to give them and then just they set about him and punched him twice full in the face. They got his wallet. He managed to get himself up and on to the train - the next train - and thereafter really the emergency services took over and were terrific. ATKINSON And as well as physically attacking him he also was threatened wasn't he? WARK He was threatened by one of the boys that they would gouge his eyes out with a knife, not that he saw a knife but the threat was there, and for anybody it would be absolutely terrifying. ATKINSON And he obviously is traumatised by all of this, I mean how has he been coping? WARK I think he has coped better than I would, I think I would have found it very hard, he actually has been back to that station, though the attack was less than three weeks ago and he indeed is back at work and his work colleagues have been hugely supportive. But I think that he would certainly not like to face them again, put it that way. ATKINSON And do you think the fact that he has mild learning difficulties had anything to do with the attack, with him being sort of singled out? WARK I think the only reason he was singled out was because he was a single figure on the platform. Thereafter, when they asked him if he had cigarettes they may have detected a hesitation in his voice, they may have associated that with disability - who knows. But to my mind any attack is appalling. However, if these boys detected any disability that Alan has and then attacked him it is doubly horrifying. ATKINSON Because MENCAP have done research where they talked about figures like one in four people with learning difficulties don't report things that do happen to them, whether it's bullying or more serious. The reason the Crown Prosecution Service is launching its policy statement is to make it very clear to victims of crime who are disabled that they have, if you like, rights that they might not know about, I mean do you think that's a good thing? WARK I think it's a good thing, however, what I would like to see is to make sure that it is very easy to report these attacks, to understand that people with learning difficulties of all different kinds might find it difficult just to get towards the place where they can report. And if disabled people feel that they cannot go forward because perhaps people won't be patient enough, perhaps they will not be believed, that is a terrible indictment in our society. And if the Crown Prosecution Service can do anything to alter that, that is all to the good. ROBINSON Kirsty Wark. Elizabeth Howe, it illustrates the difficulties in knowing whether someone has been chosen because the perpetrator hates people with disabilities or simply because they've been seen as an easy target. HOWE That's absolutely right and there's no doubt that there is a grey area between those two aspects and the disability hate crime legislation is designed at the upper end of that. But there's no doubt that some criminals do target those that they perceive to be a soft target or vulnerable because of their disabilities. But that of course can be an aggravating feature but it may not be caught by this particular provision which is specifically at the pernicious crimes that do happen, more I think than people realise, where people target disabled people because of their disability, because they perceive that they have an impairment and they target them because of that. ROBINSON Elizabeth Howe from the Crown Prosecution Service thank you. Back to the You and Yours homepage The BBC is not responsible for external websites |
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