Diane Abbott reveals trolls send sexist and racist hate mail to her offices every day

Shadow home secretary says making misogyny a hate crime is 'the right thing to do'

Diane Abbott has revealed that police officers only yesterday collected racist and misogynistic letters from her office.

The shadow home secretary said she receives threats of “rape and violence on a daily basis” both online and to her constituency office in Hackney, east London.

Speaking to a police conference in central London, Ms Abbott said: “Just yesterday the police came to my office to collect some of the letters we receive on a daily basis threatening rape, threatening violence. Hate-filled letters.”

Her words come days after Thames Valley Police was forced to apologise for retweeting a joke targeting the shadow home secretary.

Ms Abbott revealed the fresh abuse at a time when there is a national debate over whether misogyny should be brought under hate crime laws.

The government has ordered the Law Commission to carry out a review of whether sex and age should be added to “protected characteristics” that currently cover race, religion, gender identity, sexuality and disability.

On Wednesday, one of the UK’s most senior police officers said she did not want to see misogyny or misandry classed as hate crimes, and called for a return to “core policing” amid a nationwide rise in recorded crime and violence.

Chief Constable Sara Thornton, chair of the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC), said the public rightly expect “the basics – responding to emergencies, investigating and solving crime, and neighbourhood policing”.

She said police will comply with any new offences approved by parliament but that resources were “stretched” for traditional crime.

“We all think misogyny and misandry are an issue,” she told journalists. “I’m questioning whether a criminal offence is the best way of dealing with what is essentially an issue about how we all treat each other.”

Ms Abbott said she supported making misogyny a hate crime but called for the government to fund police so they are not forced to “pick and choose” what they respond to.

“I am in favour because it is the right thing to do to take the most serious action against hate crime, but we cannot give police more responsibilities without providing the resources,” the Labour politician added, calling Chief Constable Thornton’s comments “robust commonsense”.

Campaigners who have called on police and politicians to recognise misogyny as a hate crime argue that it would help tackle the “root causes” of violence against women and map the true scale of harassment.

Police forces say they are having to triage calls and prioritise what crime they respond to because of government cuts, which have seen the loss of more than 20,000 police officers since 2010.

Ministers have denied a causal link between the cuts and rising crime, but Ms Abbott accused the government of “failing to tackle crime and the causes of crime” through pressure on other public services.

Last week, the Home Affairs Committee warned of “dire consequences for public safety and criminal justice” if the government does not increase funding for struggling British police forces.

Sajid Javid, the home secretary, has vowed to fight for more money in a government-wide spending review, but officers were angered by a lack of funding for general policing in the Budget.

The latest police figures show knife crime at a record high, murder at the highest point for a decade, and rises in robbery, vehicle theft and other offences.

Arrests have halved in a decade and the proportion of offences resulting in someone being charged has plummeted to 9 per cent.

Mr Javid has vowed to fight for more money for police in a separate government-wide spending review, but told police: “If we are to make the case for more funding, this has to go hand in hand with further reforms.”

The Police Federation, which represents rank-and-file officers, has launched legal action against the government over a “derisory” 2 per cent pay rise.

And the NPCC has threatened separate legal action after forces were told that a £420m pensions shortfall must be met from their budgets.

There is also mounting concern over the prospect of a no-deal Brexit, which could cause the UK to drop out of “vital” European security databases, as well as not having access to the European Arrest Warrant, Europol and Schengen Information System.

“If there is not a new arrangement, we could find ourselves in a situation where every major criminal in the EU can evade justice by coming here. Likewise, our major criminals, homegrown terrorists or those on the run can try to evade our police and security agencies inside the EU,” said Ms Abbott.

She said Labour would vote down any Brexit deal that “leaves our security and policing in a worse position than before”.

“Our government’s hard Brexit and its lack of progress on security matters contains a real risk that this country could become a safe haven for terrorists, McMafia-style criminals, smugglers and paedophiles on the run from the EU27,” Ms Abbott added.

“I would urge both sides to think again, negotiate properly, and reach swift conclusions that can be in place before we leave the EU on 29 March.”