Call to legislate for hate crimes

The Irish Council for Civil Liberties has urged the Government to legislate for hate crime as a matter of urgency, saying it is widespread, yet “remains in the shadows” of our criminal justice system.

The ICCL yesterday launched a report based on research by the University of Limerick’s Hate and Hostility Research Group. It shows that crimes motivated by “hate” such as racism are neither recorded nor prosecuted as such in Ireland.

The absence of specific categories for hate crimes in the Irish criminal justice system also makes it difficult to prosecute any hate-fuelled or racially motivated offences.

Under legislation proposed by the ICCL, crimes against the person, property, sexual offences and public order offences would be regarded as “hate” crimes when motivated by a bias on a range of grounds, including race, colour, ethnic origin, membership of a minority, gender, sexual orientation, age and disability.

The council says this means these types of crime are not being acknowledged, effectively disappearing from the criminal justice process and victims’ experiences are not acknowledged.

The research also found a wide variance nationwide in how judges treat hate crimes.

“While the position of the Irish state is to argue that hate crime is currently being adequately addressed by the criminal justice system, we hold that this is not the case,” says the ICCL.

“Hate crime lives in the shadows of Irish criminal justice, and is systematically disappeared from the criminal justice process.”

Speaking at the launch of “Out of the Shadows: Legislating for Hate Crime in Ireland,” ICCL executive director Mark Kelly said: “This report concludes that there is an urgent need to tackle the problem through introduction of robust modern legislation that creates dedicated criminal offences and enhanced sentencing for hate-motivated crime, and introduces better reporting and recording of incidents of hate crime.”

Co-director of the University of Limerick Hate and Hostility Research Group Jennifer Schweppe added: “While the State claims that hate crime is being adequately addressed, our research shows that in fact it lives in the shadows.

“There has been a system-wide failure to recognise the harms of hate and to provide victims with appropriate protection under the law.”

According to the co-director of the UL HHR group, Amanda Haynes: “The experiences of those we interviewed – hate-motivated assaults, vandalism, property damage and threats – are simply unacceptable.

“It is not the responsibility of victims to avoid being targets of hate crime; it is the responsibility of the legislature to send out a clear message to society that this behaviour is not tolerated,” she said.

“By adopting our legislative proposals, the Government can do just this.”