Liverpool: Hate crime and social housing conference today
A conference designed for and by social landlords in collaboration with gay and trans art and social justice organisation Homotopia will take place in Liverpool today.
The Housing and Hate Crime conference will explore the role of housing providers in the prevention and early intervention of Hate Crimes, working with 160 staff from 13 Registered Social Landlords across Merseyside.
Statistics gathered by Merseyside Police for 2011/12 record 1379 Hate Crimes on Merseyside last year, those crimes which included motivation by race, disability, sexuality, gender identity, or religion.
Over the last nine months Liverpool City Council has been recording the housing status of victims and 75 percent have been tenants of social landlords.
Workshops will be delivered by Merseyside Police and the Crown Prosecution Service, disability rights organisation Daisy UK, Al Ghazali a multicultural community group, Liverpool City Council’s City Safe team and Homotopia.
The conference will also hear from Christina Marriott who leads the Integrated Equality Service for Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust. She will discuss her work identifying the greater health impacts of Hate Crime and how agencies such as housing providers and health services need to adopt an integrated approach.
Neil Townsend, a director for Riverside, said: “Housing associations have long had a commitment to delivering effective services to all our tenants and customers. We have a strong track record of working together in Merseyside and other areas and have recently signed a pledge which commits us to work to common standards, map our services and work with the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.
“This is a unique and exciting conference, indeed a first of its kind, and one which we hope will send out very clear messages about the commitment we have as social landlords.”
Bev Ayre, Homotopia’s Development Director, said: “The aim of the day is to send everyone home with a clear definition of Hate Crime, an appreciation of the devastating impacts of Hate Crime and a practical understanding of how they can take steps to improve the lives of victimised tenants.”
