The number of racist incidents reported to Gardaí almost halved in 2021 compared to the previous year, a new report has found.
On Wednesday, The Irish Network Against Racism (INAR) released its 2021 findings from iReport.ie - the racist incident reporting system.
According to the report, there were a total of 404 incidents recorded on the system in 2021.
Overall, there were fewer incidents reported when compared with 2020 figures, however, INAR has said this can be attributed to the lockdown-related spike in reports of online incidents in the previous period.
The system also recorded 154 criminal incidents, including racist assaults and a record 90 reports of illegal discrimination.
The lack of incidents reported to authorities is a reflection of the "deteriorating level of confidence in An Garda Síochána among minorities," INAR said.
Just 25 per cent of crimes were reported to Gardaí in 2021, which is down from 43 per cent in 2020.Those who did report expressed extremely low levels of satisfaction.
3/ Only 25% of those reporting racist crimes to https://t.co/4WPniTH1Eq also reported to the police, among which none was satisfied with the police’s response. Poor response + racial profiling & discrimination by the Gardai, are the main reasons why pple r reluctant to report. pic.twitter.com/HeBFe2mKSt
— INAR - Irish Network Against Racism (@INARIreland) March 23, 2022
Meanwhile, there were fewer incidents of serious threat than in previous years, but a much higher rate of public order offences which involved aggressive and abusive behaviour and usually racist language
The group most targeted in crimes were Chinese, South Asian and Other Asian, continuing a pattern change from 2020 prompted by Covid-related abuse.
Commenting on the report, INAR peer reviewer Siphiwe Moyo said: “2021 has seen a continued worsening of off-line experiences for minorities in Ireland.
“Taken with the disappointing trend in the two previous years, and the deterioration in confidence in Gardaí, the task for us is very clear, we must redouble our efforts to tackle racism including in our institutional responses to racism.
“Efforts to change institutional practice have clearly still not borne fruit as the report findings show.
“Confidence in Gardai has dropped. This may be explained in part by ongoing experiences of minorities making complaints about repeat harassment getting inappropriate responses from Gardai, and in part by ongoing instances of racial profiling.”
