Tackling Hate Crime
That this Assembly recognises that existing hate crime legislation is outdated and not fit for purpose, and that its implementation has failed victims, communities and society; notes the most recent PSNI statistics demonstrating a year-on-year increase in racist, sectarian, homophobic, transphobic, disability, and religious incidents and crimes; commends the independent Review of Hate Crime Legislation carried out by Judge Desmond Marrinan; further notes previous political commitments in Together: Building a United Community and New Decade, New Approach to tackle sectarianism, to define sectarianism in law and to give sectarianism legal expression as a hate crime; is committed to achieving a society that is diverse, inclusive, based on equality and respect, and free from discrimination; and calls for the immediate restoration of the Executive to allow a new Minister of Justice to introduce, as a priority, a hate crime bill based on international best practice to implement a new model of hate crime, a new statutory definition of sectarianism recognising sectarianism as a hate crime, and new offences to tackle misogyny.
Private Members' Motion
16/05/2022