Disability hate crime

Whilst working at the Disability Rights Commission I worked on projects relating to harassment and disability hate crime particularly in relation to social housing, so this blog entry saddens me greatly. Whilst I was advising local authorities and housing associations on how to tackle disability related harassment, in Leicestershire the guidance was really needed but not getting though.

The terribly tragic deaths of Fiona Pilkington and her daughter Francecca has been headline news today. Fiona killed herself and her disabled daughter after being driven distraught by harassment and bullying from youngsters attacking her home, her garden, physically abusing her son and verbally abusing her family. The motivation for this prolonged (it lasted a decade) abuse was that the Pilkingtons were different, Francecca was disabled and her mother and brother experienced severe emotional problems because of the abuse. They were easy targets.

I listened this morning to a Radio 5 breakfast interview with the Pilkington's local MP and I just despaired. Firstly the MP tried to turn the interview into an opportunity to play party politics, Nicky Campbell even had to ask him not to do this! But I would expect that of quite a few politicians. What really got me angry was when he was asked if this was a disability hate crime. The MP replied that lessons needed to be learned because this has shown us that "people with special needs should be monitored more closely by authorities!"

OK everything in that statement is just wrong! Special needs always gets me cross! Saying special needs puts the emphasis on the disabled people being different, needing special treatment and completely takes the emphasis away from the perpetrators of the abuse. Then to say that the answer is to monitor disabled people more closely completely lets the abusers and harassers off the hook. This puts out the message that there is nothing we can do about preventing abuse against disabled people the only answer is to monitor the disabled people as if they are the ones causing the problems!

Can you imagine any MP saying that to tackle racism local authorities need to watch people from ethnic minorities more closely?

So here is the message to any MPs. Disabled people experience all kinds of hate crime in many situations. It is hate crime because the people who attack disabled people verbally and physically do so because the person is disabled. The perpetrators target disabled people for many reasons, some of which are that disabled people are seen as weak and easy prey, different and perceived as unnatural or frightening. Society still attaches huge stigma to disability even in this day and age 15 years on from the DDA.

Even the Prime Minster on Sunday's Andrew Marr show spoke about his own disability as a handicap as if it was something he was ashamed of. He had to keep emphasising that he acquired his eye condition from being fit and healthy playing rugby. He might as well have said "I've not always been disabled (or handicapped as he seems to prefer) you know."

As a PS I am not keen on the TV news vigilantism that seems to be targeting one of the families accused of harassing the Pilkingtons. This will only end up making martyrs of some people involved and yet again sweep under the carpet the real issues in this case. Why is disability hate crime happening at all and how can we stop it.

PPS a great article from the BBC on disability hate crime, thanks to Rich Watts for alerting me to it.