I was elected a member of parliament in December 2019, just months before the Covid pandemic changed all of our lives. As Britain’s first MP of south-east Asian descent, I am well aware of the fact that, for members of east and south-east Asian (ESEA) communities, the pandemic marked a horrifying rise in racist hate crime directed towards us. This experience was not new and, four years on, it has not gone away.
During the pandemic, hate crime against the ESEA community rose by almost 70%, underpinned by a xenophobic framing of the virus’ origin. In 2021, the figures remained about 50% above those in 2019. But many of us know that these statistics do not paint the full picture, and the situation is graver than the data suggests.
A new UK-wide survey by the charity Protection Approaches and the University of Leicester’s Centre for Hate Studies paints a clearer – and more worrying – picture: 45% of ESEA community members have been subjected to a hate crime in the past year. With many enduring multiple incidents, this suggests there could be close to 1m incidents of racist abuse being directed towards ESEA people in the past year.
As so many other devastating reports on the impact of hate and racism have made clear, hateful people do not stay in their lane: 73% of hate crimes targeting ESEA women are perpetrated by men, and seven in 10 of all hate crimes committed across the UK involved a male offender. Racialised misogyny impacts thousands of women across the UK – targeted not only for their skin colour or religion, but also for being a woman.
Sadly, we know the harm that hate crime has on victims’ lives; it lasts far beyond the day or the week that the incident takes place. Many end up changing the way they live or dress, or the places they visit. This is an experience anyone who has faced hate will know, from the gay couple anxious to express their love in public, to the Muslim woman afraid to wear hijab, to the Jewish man worried about wearing a kippa.
Many in the ESEA community are doing the same: 72% of those people who had experienced hate crime felt anxious, more than half had started avoiding certain areas, 16% changed their appearance or the way they dressed and 13% even wanted to move house. Hate crime does not just affect the individuals involved, it undermines the principles of community and collaboration by sowing division and distrust. No community should feel excluded from any public place based on their background, faith or how they dress, or feel they must change these things to avoid being the targets of hate. These figures show that many are.
As with other instances of hate crime, under-reporting is chronic: only 10% of hate crime victims reported their cases to the police; 63% said they did not report anything because they did not have faith in the police to take their case seriously. We must restore faith in our justice system, to see everyone protected and justice for all, not just a few.
The Conservative government is continuing to drag its feet on the publication of a desperately needed new hate crime strategy, the absence of which is leaving policymakers ill-equipped to tackle the growing problem. Renewed focus must be directed towards building trust within communities, confronting hate head-on and making streets safer for everyone.
The grassroots organisation On Your Side, which offers a reporting service and help for the UK’s ESEA community, is doing crucial work in this regard, delivering culturally competent emotional support and guidance on navigating the criminal justice system. Its expertise must be brought on board alongside a meaningful hate crime strategy to put communities first.
The ESEA community is not a monolith. We are individuals of many backgrounds and many faiths, working in every sector across the UK, from the NHS to academia to finance to industry. These contributions should be celebrated. However, we also deserve to feel safe and respected; this means meaningful victim support, tried and tested models of assistance, and a strategy to focus on community cohesion moving forward, rebuilding trust between communities and the police.
The UK’s ESEA community deserves to be heard. The government must listen.
Sarah Owen is the Labour MP for Luton North
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