Quarter of students with a physical impairment are victims of hate

Published today, the NUS report ‘No Place for Hate – Hate crimes and incidents in further and higher education: disability’ shows that nearly a quarter (24%) of students with a physical impairment and 15% with a sensory impairment have experienced antisocial behaviour or crime motivated by a prejudice against their disability.

The report is the second in a series of four reports on student experiences of hate crime and comes with calls for universities and colleges to do more to reduce disability hate crime.

The survey of over 1000 disabled students also found that 43% of students had altered their behaviour, personal appearance or daily patterns to avoid hate incidents. Only 12% of disability hate crime incidents are reported to police.

Rupy Kaur, NUS Disabled Students’ Officer, said:

“When one in four students with a physical impairment are the victims of prejudice it’s clear that more needs to be done by our universities and colleges.

“Whilst it appears that many institutions often do an effective job of responding to hate incidents they need to take note of our recommendations and be more pro-active in stopping hate crime before it happens.”

“Our research shows that hate incidents and hate crime can have a profound impact on disabled students' mental health, affecting their study, social life and participation in societies, clubs and activities.”

You can download the full report here:

http://www.nusconnect.org.uk/resources/disabled/No-Place-for-Hate-Disability/

The Hate Crime survey has been broken down into four parts for reporting. The first report on LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans) students is available now from:

http://www.nusconnect.org.uk/news/article/lgbt/2887/

The final reports on ‘race and ethnicity’ and ‘faith and religion’ will be available in early 2012.