Home Office publish latest hate crime statistics
The Home Office has published the latest hate crime statistics for England and Wales for the year ending March 2025, showing a 2 percent increase compared with the previous year. It is worth noting that the statistics do not provide the whole picture as they do not take into consideration recorded hate crimes by the Metropolitan Police (MPS), due to changes in the way it records its data.
The increase in recorded hate crimes is a cause for concern and reflects the increasing narratives of intolerance and division shared by influential figures. The publication of these statistics also follow the recent terror attack at the Heaton Park Congregation Synagogue in Manchester, where two Jews were killed. It also follows targeted attacks on mosques.
Some of the key statistics include:
There were 115,990 hate crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales, a 2 percent increase compared with the previous year.
There was a 6 percent increase in race hate crimes and a 3% increase in religious hate crimes recorded by the police over the last year
There were falls in the other 3 strands, sexual orientation (down 2 percent), disability (down 8 percent) and transgender (down 11 percent)
There was a 19 percent increase in religious hate crimes targeted at Muslims, with a spike in these offences seen at the time of the Southport murders and subsequent disorder
The number of religious hate crimes targeted at Jewish people fell by 18 percent, from 2,093 to 1,715 offences. Caution is needed with these figures as they exclude the MPS who recorded 40 percent of all religious hate crimes targeted at Jewish people in the last year.
While the publication of annual recorded hate crime statistics are vitally important, they do not provide the true scale of the problem facing communities. Many people do not report hate crimes and there are crimes reported that do not meet the threshold to be recorded as such.
But, there are key organisations working tirelessly with their communities and with wider organisations, such as the Community Security Trust (CST) and the British Muslim Network. People are encouraged to engage with these organisations and share any information or report incidents to them. At the same time, the Independent Commission on Community & Cohesion formerly began work in June 2025 and over the next 18 months, it will engage communities across the country to understand how to enhance community connectedness, cohesion and resilience.