Responding to the speech made by Chief Constable Sara Thornton at NPCC and the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners conference, Maria Miller MP for Basingstoke and Chair of Women and Equalities Select Committee said; -
“It’s really regrettable that any community leader would chose to characterise any form of hate crime as just a 'deserving issue"; this will do little to help increase the reporting of race or disability hate crimes which can blight people's lives.”
“The Women and Equality Select Committee has called for urgent action to tackle sexual harassment that is the most common form of violence against women and would be seen by some as the most common form of misogynistic behaviour women encounter: sexual assault, groping and unwanted photos are some of the types of sexual harassment many women highlighted in the evidence we received.”
“In our recommendations to the government the committee has not called for more Police enforcement as there are other more effective ways to change attitudes and behaviour towards women, including the use of licensing conditions by local authorities to insist on training for staff in pubs and clubs; conditions on bus and train operators to take a zero tolerance towards sexual harassment on public transport; and a statutory requirements on universities to report on sexual harassment on campus in the same way as happens in the USA.”
"It was the decision of Nottingham Police to develop a category of reporting called Misogynistic Hate Crime because of unacceptable levels of intimidation of women in public places. It was specifically put in place to make the county a safer place for women. That is something we should all support."
"The Women and Equalities Select Committee most recent report "Sexual harassment of women and girls in public places" did take some evidence on this issue, whilst the select committee decided not to call for misogyny to be made a specific hate crime at the moment, we did welcome the decision from the Government to make it part of the existing Law Commission review.”