Hate crime

Hate crime

At Newydd, we are committed to tackling hate crime and will investigate all cases fully and take appropriate action.

What is a hate crime?

Hate incidents and hate crime are acts of verbal, written or physical abuse. It can be an act of harassment or intimidation against a person or a group of people because of their perceived personal characteristics. This would include hostility or prejudice, or includes words or behaviour, based on a person’s perceived:

  • race
  • religion
  • sexual orientation
  • transgender identity
  • disability

A hate crime can include verbal abuse, intimidation, threats, harassment, assault, and bullying, as well as damage to property. The perpetrator (the person committing the crime) could be someone unknown to you, or they could be a friend. If the victim believes something is a hate incident, it should be treated and recorded as such by the person it is being reported to.


Mate crime

Mate crime is a new term and usually means befriending vulnerable people to take advantage of them, exploit or abuse them. It can be regarded as a form of disability hate crime or age hate crime but can also look like a case of domestic abuse or violence. Victims of mate crime are often vulnerable due to learning disabilities, mental health condition, or age (targeting vulnerable older or younger people).

Hate crime can take place both in person and online.

What is online hate crime?

Online hate is posting and sharing hateful and prejudiced content against an individual, group or community. It can take the form of derogatory, demonising, and dehumanising statements, threats, identity-based insults, and slurs. If a post is hostile towards a person’s race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or gender identity, it could be viewed as hate speech. If it is serious enough, it may break the law, whether it is online or offline.

Online hate can be expressed through many types of media, including text, images, videos, and audio. These different types of media content are sometimes combined.

How to report a hate crime?

If you have been a victim of hate crime you can report it to the police or to the National Hate Crime Report and Support Centre (run by Victim Support). You can also report these crimes if you see them happen to someone else.

Police

  • In an emergency call 999
  • In a non-emergency dial 101
  • The name of your local Police Community Support Officer (PCSO) can be found on www.police.uk

You can also contact the Police in your area directly by email:

Victim Support

You can talk to Victim Support as an alternative to the Police. They provide independent, confidential help, advice and support to victims and witnesses of hate crimes in Wales.

You can call Victim Support free at any time on 0300 3031 982, email Hate.CrimeWales@victimsupport.org.uk or contact their live chat system on their website here.

Our Safer Communities Officers

Our Safer Communities’ Officers Kay Greatrex (left) and Sarah Johnson (right) provide a proactive, customer focused service to enable our tenants to live safely in their communities. They work to prevent and deter negative behaviour on our estates which affect our tenants' enjoyment of their home and the surrounding area.  

Our Safer Communities Officers work closely with partner agencies, such as South Wales Police, Environmental Health, and the local council to help develop a multi-agency approach to create initiatives to tackle the root cause of anti-social behaviour.

You can contact either Kay Greatrex or Sarah Johnson by phone on 0303 040 1998 or email safer.communities@newydd.co.uk.