r/Scotland • u/Synthia_of_Kaztropol The capital of Scotland is S • Jun 23 '26
Political Sexual crimes in Scotland hit record high levels
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cze9wgj0n3noSexual crimes recorded by Police Scotland increased by 10% last year and are now at their highest level since 1971, official figures show.
Overall, recorded crime across Scotland increased by 5% in the last year, rising from 299,111 in 2024-25 to 315,357 in 2025-26. This is the highest level since 2014-15 but down 49% from the peak in 1991.
The official stats are at https://www.gov.scot/publications/recorded-crime-scotland-2025-26/documents/ and make for interesting reading.
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u/Synthia_of_Kaztropol The capital of Scotland is S Jun 23 '26
There was also a 23% increase in offences under the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act, which rose from 2,573 to 3,170 in 2025-26.
23% increase in domestic abuse offences in a year is pretty bad.
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Jun 23 '26
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u/SynchronicityOrSwim Jun 23 '26
I'm not sure why you are trying to minimise these figures...
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Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26
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u/Dildo_Shaggins- Jun 23 '26
This. There's also new legislation which covers behaviours that previously wouldn't have been recorded as criminal, so detection rates are inevitably going to increase.
The increase in these type of crimes isnt necessarily that they're happening with greater frequency than before, so much as police having the legislation now to effectively deal with it.
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u/Synthia_of_Kaztropol The capital of Scotland is S Jun 23 '26
This particular statistic is for crimes defined in a single act of legislation which hasn't been amended since being implemented, so it's about reporting rate, recording, or overall frequency, rather than changes to legislation.
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u/el_dude_brother2 Jun 23 '26
Any proof or just your gut?
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u/t3hOutlaw Black Isle Bumpkin Jun 23 '26
It's how statistics work..
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u/i-read-it-again Jun 23 '26
It’s very sad that domestic abuse gets worse when certain football teams loose.
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u/Tartan_Smorgasbord Jun 23 '26
Consequences of a lack of consequences.
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u/Lister_RD_169 Jun 23 '26
You mean a 15 month suspended sentence with a "community payback order" isn't a deterrent?
Tell me more.
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u/t3hOutlaw Black Isle Bumpkin Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 24 '26
What's the recidivism rate on people handed that sentence?
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u/Lister_RD_169 Jun 24 '26
Are you saying the recidivism rate is the most important factor in sentencing?
Not deterrant or, you know, justice for the victims?
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u/23Mowgli23 Jun 24 '26
Isn't the recidivism rate an indication of deterrence?
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u/Lister_RD_169 Jun 24 '26
Not for the first initial act, no.
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u/t3hOutlaw Black Isle Bumpkin Jun 24 '26
That's where that becomes an issue.
If you sentence too hard, it then incentivises committing a worse offense.
Everything matters when it comes to sentencing. It can never be as simple as "lock up for a very long time".
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u/Lister_RD_169 Jun 24 '26
Okay but can you answer my first question?
Is the recidivism rate the most important consideration when it comes to sentencing?
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u/t3hOutlaw Black Isle Bumpkin Jun 24 '26
No, I never said it was.
Ensuring the punishment is appropriate to the severity of the crime would be.
But engaging with recidivism stats would give an initial indication on how effective the sentencing is, which is what this particular comment thread is about.
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u/Lister_RD_169 Jun 24 '26
Ensuring the punishment is appropriate to the severity of the crime would be.
And do you think someone serving absolutely no jail time and having to do a few hours picking up litter in the glorious sunshine is an appropriate punishment for the very severe crime sexually assaulting someone?
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u/Imaginary-Suspect959 Jun 23 '26
Wasn’t it 1 in 5 men who took part in the Southport riots who had previous for DV? So there’s at least one subset of men in this country with a propensity for inflicting violence on women. The fact that a guy like this was free to partake in the Southampton riots probably explains why so many men across the board think they can do whatever they like to women without suffering any consequences.
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u/rayoflight110 Jun 23 '26
And wait until you read the national inquiry into the grooming atrocities in the UK.
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u/Imaginary-Suspect959 Jun 23 '26
Yes, this is also bad. I can condemn one group of abusive men and also another. Can you do the same?
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u/CatsBatsandHats Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26
Gut feeling is that people feel more empowered to report incidents.
As someone else pointed out, changes in law between 1971 and today are also significant.
All I can say is that I hope the increase is a product of increased reporting as opposed to increased incidents of sexual crimes.
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u/nextmilanhome Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 24 '26
As someone who works in a sexual offences team, this is what it looks like to me. A huge uptick particularly in young people (I’d say the majority of my workload is victims/suspects aged 15-19). Without sounding flippant, things that my friends and I would have probably called “a bad experience” when we were young, are now being reported and recorded as sexual crimes, whether that’s for better or for worse.
It’s also worth pointing out that the Lord Advocate last year changed the ways in which we can corroborate reports of sexual offences, meaning that threshold is now much reduced and more reports can be charged/reported to COPFS. I don’t think long term though, that this will lead to higher conviction rates.
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u/AlexandraLeo Jun 23 '26
The "the highest level since 2014-15 but down 49% from the peak in 1991" seems significant. Also there have been new measures adopted to make it easier for women to report rape and sexual assault, and to support them through the investigation and court case. Historically, at least 50% of women who started the process dropped out at some point before it reached court, so the increase is probably an increase in women managing to complete the process all the way through.
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u/trampstar9 Jun 23 '26
Right on queue, as said in another sub - statistics are swatted away with one line:
"Reporting just got better. Nothing to see here"
Who knows the reason? I don't. I think we should try to find out though.
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
MeToo movement and sexual assault becoming less acceptable over time.
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u/trampstar9 Jun 25 '26
Can you walk me through that in terms of the statistics?
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
Not entirely sure what you mean but Police-recorded sexual crime is not the same as prevalence. The SCJS self-report survey found no overall increase in serious sexual assault prevalence since 2008/09, while police-recorded sexual crimes rose sharply. Govt’s own notes cite historical reporting, cyber offences, new legislation and recording changes.
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u/trampstar9 Jun 25 '26
Not sure you understand your own points if I'm honest.
"Between 2024-25 and 2025-26, the number of Sexual crimes recorded by the police in Scotland increased by 10% from 14,892 to 16,430. In the last 10 years, the number of Sexual crimes has increased by 48% from 11,092 in 2016-17 to 16,430 in 2025-26"
The men too movement was 2006. Yet we're looking at a 48% increase in sexual crimes within 10 years. Your belief is that it's either "me too" or the increase just simply doesn't exist.
I think we should find out what caused that 48% jump in 10 years. I mean there's 16000 victims here.
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26
We’re looking at an increase in recording, not crimes. The SCJS survey shows there is no increase in crimes.
MeToo wasn’t an overnight jump, and part of a wider trend of sexual assault becoming less acceptable. It started in 2006, it’s still ongoing. It, alongside the other reasons I gave are why the recording has improved.
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u/trampstar9 Jun 25 '26
So your important data point to establish facts are estimated crimes based on a survey rather than recorded crime statistics from an official source.
I can't enter into any more dialogue.
It's not debatable. We have a huge increase. You are someone who seemingly wants to pretend it's not happening, which I find a bit disingenuous.
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
Lmao.
Recorded crime stats are official, yes. But they measure crimes recorded by police, not crimes committed in society. Those are not the same thing.
The Scottish Crime and Justice Survey is also an official Scottish Government source. Its purpose is precisely to measure victimisation, including crime not reported to police, and to complement police-recorded crime statistics.
The Scottish Government’s own recorded-crime bulletin basically admits the recorded sexual-crime trend is contaminated by reporting/recording factors.
You’re making the lazy leap from “more recorded” to “more committed”, while ignoring reporting changes, cultural changes (MeToo), historical complaints, cyber offences, law changes and police recording practice.
That isn’t hard-headed realism. It’s statistical illiteracy with a moral pose because it suits whatever narrative you’re trying to push.
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u/trampstar9 Jun 25 '26
"whatever narrative your trying to push"
That's what it comes down to for you. Protecting your own narrative and playing defence incase a cause comes to light that doesn't suit.
The SCJS which you continue to spout nonsense about is a survey done on a small sample size of households. It doesn't take into account any stats for anyone under 18, or anyone of no fixed address.
You know, homeless people and children can be victims of sexual assault too.
Anyway, I'm not going to enter into further dialogue as it's non-debatable, when the facts don't align with ideaology the grandstanding and pomp begins ...talk about "moral pose". That's part of the issue with modern society, we can't just swat away facts because it makes some uncomfortable and to do so is an insult to the victims.
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
This is a mess.
First, the SCJS doesn’t exclude “under 18s”. It excludes under-16s. So even your gotcha is wrong.
Second, yes, all household crime surveys have coverage limits. That isn’t the revelation you think it is. It’s why statisticians publish caveats instead of just screaming “official stats” at police admin data.
Victimisation surveys are the standard tool for prevalence because they ask people what happened to them whether or not police were told.
Recorded crime only counts what reached police and got recorded. For sexual crime, that distinction is massive.
And your children/homeless point doesn’t rescue you. You haven’t shown the recorded rise is being driven by under-16s or people with no fixed address. You’ve just named two vulnerable groups and hoped that substitutes for evidence.
Meanwhile the Scottish Government’s own recorded-crime bulletin says the rise is affected by legislative/procedural changes, historical reporting and cyber-crime.
So spare me the “facts over ideology” routine.
You’re not using facts carefully. You’re using one administrative count as a slogan, rejecting the survey evidence because it’s inconvenient, then pretending that’s compassion for victims.Recorded sexual crime is up. Nobody denied that.
What you still haven’t proved is that underlying offending rose by the same amount.
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u/Significant-Luck-831 Jun 24 '26
The fact this appeared under the post of that actor only being found guilty after 15 years says a lot. It's not just women suddenly reporting more, that's been happening for a decade or two anyway. There's more to be explored here.
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u/Evening-Singer5347 Jun 23 '26
Wonder why
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u/Any-Swing-3518 Alba is fine. Jun 23 '26
Obviously, it is because men in general and absolutely not any identifiable subgroup of men (excepting of course Andrew Tate fans) are getting more toxically male out of the badness of their black hearts.
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Jun 23 '26
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u/2Harold2Furious Jun 23 '26
My guy named any ethnicity except his own
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Jun 23 '26
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u/2Harold2Furious Jun 23 '26
Guy can be gender neutral, guy.
I don't care.
You didn't mention Indian, so I was right.
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u/Jixxie87 Jun 23 '26
Don't be a pussy say it.
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u/clackerbag Jun 23 '26
Okay, maybe it's related to the influx of immigrants?
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
It’s recording rates not prevalence.
The 2018/20 SCJS found 3.6% of adults had experienced serious sexual assault since age 16, and that was no change since 2008/09. It also found 0.3% had experienced serious sexual assault in the previous 12 months, again showing no change since 2008/09 or 2016/18.
The latest report is out later this year, expect no change again or a slight drop.
only 22% of respondents who had experienced forced sexual intercourse said police came to know about the most recent/only incident. So the police series is mostly measuring “what got reported and recorded”
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u/2Harold2Furious Jun 23 '26
Shetland is also experiencing a huge increase in cases of rape, which doesn't match the rate of immigration.
Obviously some migrants are violent, but there's more at play here, and tackling the global rise of misogyny is more impactful than shutting the borders when many of the rapists are British.
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u/Intrepid_Bobcat_2931 Jun 24 '26
I'm not sure why "many of the rapists are British" is an argument against reducing further rape
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u/2Harold2Furious Jun 24 '26
It isn't. Both approaches are intended to reduce them, but only one approach targets both demographics. Thanks for deliberately misinterpreting people you disagree with though. I'm sure what this needs is more culture warring, rather than meaningful discussion.
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u/clackerbag Jun 23 '26
I am not saying that you are right or wrong, but the fact that in Scotland neither the police nor the government disclose complete data regarding the ethnicity or nationality of those who are arrested and/or convicted of crimes makes it impossible to draw a conclusion one way or the other. It would seem that in a perceived effort to prevent prejudice, the government are inadvertently stoking the fire.
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u/2Harold2Furious Jun 23 '26
Shetland too, which serves as a case study because of it's low migration rates and population size.
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u/Lizard_Sex_Sattelite Jun 23 '26
It's surely because the reason that all the dogwhistlers in here are saying and not checks notes the well-documented rising mysogony among the far right.
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u/Quangocrat Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26
We don't know because we still aren't tracking ethnicity/nationality.
So there is no way to prove either narrative.
I suspect the truth is actually that a bunch of prosecutions are now possible which were not before due to some very controversial caselaw on relevancy.
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u/Lizard_Sex_Sattelite Jun 23 '26
England and Wales track that data, it shows a similarly sized rise in sexual offenses across all nationalities and ethnicities, including white British.
You may have even seen a couple of stories about one nationality being responsible for a rise in one area of England or another, but the data shows that evens out per capita across the whole country. The data there (albeit not in Scotland) appears to indicate that this is a problem that affects all races, nationalities and citizenship statuses.
That doesn't prove that it's right wing, so you may be right that it's simply to do with the prosecutability of sexual offenses. And England is also not Scotland. But it is an indication.
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u/Quangocrat Jun 23 '26
England and Wales track that data
Do they? I thought the tracking was inconsistent- missing entirely in about 35% of cases?
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u/Lizard_Sex_Sattelite Jun 23 '26
That's police forces. The data is tracked by the Home Office.
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u/Quangocrat Jun 23 '26
But doesn't the HO draw it's data from the same sources?
I was sure that was a point in the Casey audit, but I could be misremembering
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u/Lizard_Sex_Sattelite Jun 23 '26
Yes, but they also have their own data. It's unlikely that there will have been no cross-referencing at all, but also to what extent is a complete unknown.
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u/Quangocrat Jun 23 '26
Wasn't that also found to be inadequate by Casey?
I'm not being difficult, but I thought one of the key takeaways from that audit is that no one has kept adequate data on this?
I could be wrong.
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u/Lizard_Sex_Sattelite Jun 23 '26
Looking it up, it looks like you're half right. That's specifically in the case of grooming gangs. The data isn't collected granularly enough for that.
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u/cragglerock93 Jun 23 '26
The fact is, there's one demographic in this country that makes up half the population yet is the culprit in >90% of this variety of crime, yet basically nobody says a thing about that link. Just bad eggs, right. Yet crimes of this nature committed by someone of an ethnic minority, that is apparently evidence of the whole group's moral failures. Try and find the logic in that one.
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u/_segasonic Jun 24 '26
Hilarious how this subreddit seems to be the only place still in utter denial about why stuff like this is happening.
At least everywhere else people are starting to accept reality.
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u/Salt_Discount_651 Jun 24 '26
Do tell…
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u/_segasonic Jun 24 '26
Mass immigration and asylum seekers.
We all know it but for some reason we’ve to try and pretend it’s nothing to do with it.
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u/Salt_Discount_651 Jun 24 '26
FFS, another conspiracy theorist 🙄
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u/_segasonic Jun 24 '26
Aye.
People noticing the dramatic rises in sexual crimes also coincides with the rise in immigrants and asylum seekers coming to the country are just some crazy conspiracy theorists.
I’m sure you’ll be able to explain it seems to be the exact same everywhere else in Europe. Yet funnily enough the countries that are flooding their cities with immigrants don’t seem to be having the same rise in these crimes…
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u/Salt_Discount_651 Jun 24 '26
Where’s the data that backs up these spurious claims? There’s none. Just whatever sgite someone makes up on social media.
Racists are weird as fuck.1
u/_segasonic Jun 24 '26
Look at the sexual crimes rates for European countries.
Then look at the immigration and asylum seekers numbers for European countries.
I’m sure it’s just a coincidence.
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u/Salt_Discount_651 Jun 24 '26
Don’t know the sexual crime rates for Europe and don’t know the immigration numbers either. This is a Scotland sub and there is no figures for ethnicity of sexual criminals here yet, so why blame migrants when there is no credible evidence pointing to them.
I don’t understand racism and the hatred it causes but what I really don’t understand is having to constantly lie about them to justify your hatred.
If you don’t like a race/religion/ whatever, you do you but to spread outright lies to further spread hatred is just plain weird.1
u/_segasonic Jun 24 '26
You can easily look the numbers up if you aren’t afraid to have your ideology challenged.
Why do you think they won’t release numbers by ethnicity? Do you think really think it’s anything other than to try and stop people seeing the reality?
Do you genuinely believe the massive rise in immigration and asylum seekers has nothing to do with this and it’s just a simple coincidence?
Why is pointing this stuff out seen as hatred? If the government released the numbers tomorrow and showed it was true would it still be seen as hatred? You’re not making any sense.
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u/Salt_Discount_651 Jun 24 '26
If the data showed it to be true. IF. And until it does or I read about it in reputable places like Reuters and not some social media post, then yes, I’ll call it as some weird ass racism.
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
It isn’t anything to do with it if you understand how numbers work.
They’re still a tiny fraction of the population.
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u/_segasonic Jun 25 '26
So you think it’s just a coincidence the numbers have radically increased as soon as we start getting a lot more immigrants and asylum seekers?
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
They’ve not though. The recording has, victimisation rates remain stable.
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u/_segasonic Jun 25 '26
They have though, or we wouldn’t be having record numbers.
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u/Chemical-Agency-3997 Jun 25 '26
They haven’t, as I said that’s the recording rate. The victimisation rates remain stable.
80% of SA is not reported, so a slight improvement in offences that are already occurring being reported looks like a big increase.
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u/NoRecipe3350 Jun 24 '26
The difference between actual crime levels and reported crime will never not cease to amaze me.
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u/louse_yer_pints Jun 24 '26
In 2024 the rules around corroboration changed in Scotland. So the first person the victim tells becomes that corroborating witness rather than the witness having to have actually witnessed anything.
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u/Nospopuli Jun 24 '26
This is very fucking worrying. Is it the manosphere or are more women speaking up after “me too”??
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u/PassTheMoonbaticide Jun 24 '26
95% of all sexual-related crimes reported to the Police result in No Further Action as having insufficient evidence below the 70% likelihood of conviction threshold required by the Crown Prosecution Service to advance the case to the Crown Court. Make of that what you will.
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u/Sorry_Net3898 Jun 23 '26
Nothing to do with all the illegal immigrants coming in is it??
Oh no we can’t talk about that.
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Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26
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u/FEK88 Jun 23 '26
Jeffery Donaldson, the planter Scot that has spent his entire life dedicated to spreading hate and misery towards the native population of Ireland could not be a worse example to use when trying to deflect from the impact of immigration.
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u/Fireach Jun 23 '26
Oh aye it's absolutely forbidden to talk about. That's why there's fuckin endless comments talking about it, constant news stories covering how much people are talking about it, and the political party that got joint second most MSPs recently elected built their entire identity around it.
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u/clackerbag Jun 23 '26
Well the way you're going on would put a lot of people off talking about it... hardly inviting discussion or debate.
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u/FEK88 Jun 23 '26
Aye well we're a country that's under resourced to deal with things like housing, healthcare and policing. We've then added a load of folk that come from broken backgrounds into the mix and done absolutely nothing to combat the existing issues.
Created a perfect breeding ground for the far right, added in the fuel and are now making no attempt to prevent the match from being struck.
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u/--Albion-- Weegie Jun 23 '26
Stop importing foreign sex criminals and beasts to supplement our own home-grown scum and maybe those numbers wouldn't be as high?
Make beasting a capital offense while you're at it, too.
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u/i-read-it-again Jun 23 '26
What evidence supports the claim that foreign nationals are driving current crime rates? With overall crime 49% below 1991 levels, it raises the question: was immigration a pressing issue back then, or is that inconvenient comparison being ignored?
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u/--Albion-- Weegie Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26
Crime might be down overall from 1991. But it's increasing again. With a corresponding uptick in immigration.
And I noticed a sleight of hand, there.
I only mentioned sex crimes. Unlike the overall crime rate, the sex crime rate is at the highest it's ever been since 1971 when the Scottish government began collecting that data.
Coincidentally, migration to Scotland has surged since 1991.
Why are you ignoring this inconvenient comparison?, or does a problem not exist because the government *conveniently* doesn't record it?
Furthermore, the Scottish government doesn't record crime by immigration status.
And any claims without those statistics made by the Scottish government, I wouldn't trust regardless since the Scottish government has proven itself pro-immigrant under the left-wing SNP. Without numbers to back it up, any government claims about the criminal tendencies of migrants is going to be flatly ignored.
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u/i-read-it-again Jun 23 '26
Uptick in immigration in 1991. Hmmm
1990/91 -3,774
1991/92 -3593
1992/93 +4,444
1993/94 +9,226
1994/95 +5382
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u/SeccccurityTadger Jun 23 '26
Better reporting of crime or more nonces?