The relationship between race and crime in the United Kingdom is the subject of academic studies, government surveys, media coverage, and public concern since at least the Second World War.
Data gathered from a variety of sources consistently shows that ethnic minorities in the UK have been, and are currently, over-represented across the criminal justice system compared to the white population.
The long-term trend in the prevalence of hate crime incidents (about half of which are race hate crime) has seen a decline since the relevant data collection began in 1988, despite spikes around specific events. However, the number of hate crimes recorded by the police has risen steeply since 2014, primarily because of changes in recording practices and increased reporting.
A rise in terrorist offences by ethnic minorities has been accompanied by corresponding increases in white supremacist terrorism, along with an increase in people trafficking and related crimes fuelled by geopolitical events.
The extent to which race is correlated with crime, particularly in the case of violent crime, is complicated by confounding factors such as economic and social deprivation, police counting rules, and issues such as age and cultural histories.
Racially motivated and racially aggravated crimes
From the antisemitic portrayal of Shylock as a userous Jew by William Shakespeare in the 1600s, through the race riots of 1919, to racial segregation and acts of Parliament, and in common with other European countries, race and racism has been part of both the social and legislative history of the United Kingdom.
In UK law, some crimes are defined as "racially motivated" if hostility on the basis of race is part of the motive. Since the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, some offences are defined as "racially aggravated" if the offender shows hostility based on race, colour, nationality, or ethnic origins during the incident. In such cases, the judge or magistrates are required by law to state that the offence was aggravated by race and impose a longer or more severe penalty than would have been given for the "basic" crime (e.g., harassment or public order) alone.
High-profile racially-motivated crimes in modern times include the murders of Stephen Lawrence in 1993 and Kriss Donald in 2004. Examples of crimes with an unproven or suspected racial motivation are the New Cross house fire in 1981, and the deaths of Ricky Reel in 1997 and Traiq Javed in 2000.
Additionally, stirring up racial hatred is proscribed under the Public Order Act 1986 and the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006. For example, Lucy Connolly was convicted of this offence for her role in the 2024 United Kingdom riots.
Various other publicised crimes have been related to race or racism, such as the police killing of anti-racst protestor Blair Peach in 1979, the case of Satpal Ram in 1986, the murder of the British MP Jo Cox by a far right activist in 2016, and the 'grooming gangs' scandal which has resulted in controversy about ethnicity and criminal behaviour.
Culture and the media Young men, particularly young black men, are commonly stereotyped as engaging in criminal behaviour. For example, concerns over mugging in the 1970s were focused on young African-Caribbean men, and notwithstanding the findings of the Scarman Report into the inner city riots of the 1980s, which found that "complex political, social and economic factors" created a "disposition towards violent protest", the behaviour at the time was largely blamed on young black people. A content analysis of mainstream news in 2008 found that just over four in 10 stories for all young men and boys were crime-related, but almost seven in 10 stories about black young men and boys related in some form to crime. Sensationalist reporting and political rhetoric relating to some events have also lead to 'spikes' in hate crime.
In December 2009 Rod Liddle in The Spectator referred to two black rappers, Brandon Jolie and Kingsley Ogundele, who had plotted to kill Jolie's 15-year-old pregnant girlfriend, as "human filth" and said the incident was not an anomaly. Liddle continued: The overwhelming majority of street crime, knife crime, gun crime, robbery and crimes of sexual violence in London is carried out by young men from the African-Caribbean community. Of course, in return, we have rap music, goat curry and a far more vibrant and diverse understanding of cultures which were once alien to us. For which, many thanks.
Liddle was accused of racism after his comments, to which he replied that his comments were not racism but a discussion of multiculturalism. In March 2010, the Press Complaints Commission upheld a complaint against Liddle, since "the magazine had not been able to demonstrate that the 'overwhelming majority' of crime in all of the stated categories had been carried out by members of the African-Caribbean community". After the publication of the crime figures in June 2010, The Sunday Telegraph claimed that Liddle was "largely right on some of his claims", but "that he was probably wrong on his claims about knife crimes and violent sex crimes".
Since 2011, there has been widespread media, public and policy debate in the UK around so-called ‘grooming’, depicted as a new crime threat associated with ‘Asian sex gangs’ who deliberately seek out white British girls for repeated sexual abuse. In particular, men of Pakistani heritage were linked to on-street grooming activities, but white men were linked to online cases. Commening on the disparity in the reaction to information about the race of perpetrators, Sadie Robinson of the Socialist Worker wrote:Sexual abuse and sexist attitudes aren’t the preserve of Asian men. The press described the abusers in Newcastle as an “Asian sex gang,” “Asian sex ring” and “Asian grooming gang”. The usual calls for Asian people to stamp out abuse—with the implication that they are otherwise responsible for it—followed. In April three white brothers, one white woman and an Asian man were jailed for child sex offences including rape. None of the press described the Sheffield abusers as a “Mostly White Rape Gang”. White people were not called upon to root out abuse in their “communities”. Comment pieces explaining why white people are particularly sexist did not follow.British police forces, and especially the Metropolitan Police, have been accused of institutional racism on a number of occasions. One example often cited is the Mangrove Nine, a group eventually acquitted in 1970. In 1995, the London Metropolitan Police commissioner Paul Condon stated that the majority of robberies in London were committed by black people. Operation Trident was set up in March 1998 by the Metropolitan Police to investigate gun crime in London's black community after black-on-black shootings in Lambeth and Brent.
Demographics England and Wales A 2024 report by the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) found that ethnic minorities were over-represented across the criminal justice system compared to the white population. The greatest disparity existed for the black population, particularly black children in the criminal justice system. The black population makes up 4% of the population in England and Wales, but represented 18% of stops and searches; 13% of custodial remands; 12% of the prison population; 10% of prosecutions, convictions and custodial sentences; and 9% of arrests. While members of minority ethnic groups are more likely to be arrested, white people had the highest conviction ratio in 2021.
Scotland and Northern Ireland
In 2021/22, the vast majority of stop and searches were conducted on people identifying as White Scottish/White Other British. The proportion of stop and searches being carried out on minority ethnic individuals remained fairly stable over the five years prior to that. 94.9% of the average daily prison population in Scotland self-identified as white, while it was estimated that the incarceration rate for people who identify as African, Caribbean or black, or from other ethnic groups, was significantly higher.
In 2022, 21% of those from black or minority ethnic groups in Scotland reported experiencing discrimination, compared to 8% of those from a white ethnic group.
While anti-social behaviour incidents have shown a downward trend since 2006/07, for the period ending March 2025, Northern Ireland recorded the highest recorded since the data series began in 2004/05. The figures include the impact of racist riots in Belfast in August 2024 and a wave of violent attacks on migrant families in June 2025, a rise of 48.5% from the previous year.
Street crime and policing
Stop and search
Legislation Both Section 1 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and Section 60 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 give police the power to 'stop and search'. Section 1 gives permission for searches where any officer has reasonable grounds for suspecting that they will find stolen or prohibited articles. Section 60 applies to weapons or dangerous instruments only. Section 60 powers must be authorised by a senior officer (Inspector or above), and allow officers to search anyone within a designated area and for a limited time, even if they show no suspicious behaviour.
Section 43 of the Terrorism Act 2000 is the suspicion-based stop and search power for general counter-terrorism policing, equivalent to that of Section 1 in which any officer can stop and search a person or their vehicle on suspicion of terrorism.
Schedule 7 allows a police, immigration or customs official to stop, search and detain a person passing through a UK border (for example, at an airport or port) for up to 6 hours in order to determine whether they are a terrorist. The use of Schedule 7 powers requires neither ‘reasonable grounds for suspicion’ nor prior authorisation by a senior officer to conduct searches of a person’s property or vehicle, take fingerprints, photographs, and DNA samples as well as request passwords for electronic devices. It does not allow 'intimate' (strip) searches without authorisation.
Under the Criminal Justice Act 1991, section 95, the government collects annual statistics based on race and crime.Criminal Justice Act 1991 – Section 95. legislation.gov.uk. Retrieved 27 September 2010.Marsh and Melville, p. 166.
Statistics For the year 2016/2017, stop and search was 8.4 times as likely to occur for a black person in England and Wales compared to a white person. Similarly, the rate of stop and searches in mixed ethnicity and Asian people was more than twice as likely, when compared with that of a person with a white ethnicity.Stop and Search Open Data Tables: Police Powers and Procedures: England and Wales – Year Ending March 2017 (Home Office, London, 2017) Between 2019 and 2020, black people were nine times more likely to be stopped and searched compared to a white person.
Between April 2019 and March 2020, the use of stop and search powers under Section 60 (for weapons or dangerous instruments) occurred 11,408 times, which was an increase of 19% from the year prior.
London
, 46% of Londoners are of an ethnic minority, compared to 14% in the rest of England, while 13.5% of the population of London is black.