Hate crimes in England and Wales have jumped by the biggest amount since 2017, according to the latest official figures.
In the year ending March 2022, there were 155,841 hate crimes recorded by the police - a 26 per cent increase compared with the previous year.
This is the biggest increase since 2017, when there was a 29 per cent rise.
Anneliese Dodds, Labour’s shadow equalities minister, branded the statistics evidence of “Tory failure”.
Hate crimes are defined as those motivated by prejudice against someone on the grounds of race or ethnicity, religion or beliefs, sexual orientation, disability and transgender identity.
The majority of the hate crimes (70%) were racially motivated, with 109,843 offences recorded - an increase of 19 per cent.
Religious hate crimes increased by 37 per cent to 8,730 offences.
Sexual orientation hate crimes increased by 41% to 26,152 and transgender identity hate crimes by 56% to 4,355.
Both of these increases were also the largest percentage annual increase in these offences since the year ending March 2012.
“Transgender issues have been heavily discussed on social media over the last year, which may have led to an increase in related hate crimes,” the Home Office said.
Disability hate crimes rose by 43% to 14,242 - the largest percentage annual increase seen since 2017.
The Home Office said it was unclear to what degree the spike in recorded hate crime was a “genuine rise” or or due to “continued recording improvements and more victims having the confidence to report”.