Judith has spoken in Parliament after recently published figures showed that – between September 2021 and 2022 – there were 4,924 reports of spiking-related offences in the UK.
Between November 2017 and November 2021, however, the Ministry of Justice recorded just 40 convictions for such offences.
In January, a Home Office Minister confirmed
that the Government did not consider there to be “any gap in the law”, adding that spiking was adequately covered in legislation by several other offences.
Judith asked the Secretary of State:
“Does he agree with the Home Office Minister’s assessment that there are no gaps in the law relating to spiking, and if so, how can this low conviction rate be explained?”
Justice Secretary, Dominic Raab, responded: “I think the challenge is less gaps in the law, and more evidential difficulties in bringing prosecutions.”
Judith added:
“The issue for the Government is that they are accepting that as the law stands, this terrible crime of spiking and subsequent criminality stemming from it is simply not getting prosecuted, let alone resulting in a conviction.
“A stand-alone offence under law for spiking would enable more prosecutions and convictions.”
Comentários