Bath MP Wera Hobhouse has renewed her call for misogyny to be recognised as a hate crime, warning that online abuse targeting women is growing rapidly and that the law is struggling to keep pace with new technology.
Speaking in Parliament, the Liberal Democrat MP argued that crimes motivated by hostility towards women should be formally recognised in hate crime legislation. She said current laws risk falling behind as new forms of online abuse continue to emerge.
Mrs Hobhouse, who successfully campaigned to make upskirting a criminal offence, raised concerns about the growing number of online accounts presenting themselves as “nightlife content” or “walking tours” while publishing footage of women on nights out without their knowledge or consent.
According to figures cited by the MP, this type of content has been viewed more than three billion times over the past three years. She said the videos are often accompanied by misogynistic comments and abuse, generating engagement and profit for content creators.
Mrs Hobhouse also highlighted the wider issue of violence against women and girls, noting that one in four women in England and Wales have been raped or sexually assaulted since the age of 16. She argued that such crimes should not be viewed as isolated incidents but as part of a broader pattern of hostility towards women.
The Government’s Crime and Policing Act 2026 recognises sex-related hostility as an aggravating factor in certain offences. However, Mrs Hobhouse said this does not go far enough and called for changes to hate crime legislation.
The Bath MP noted she had repeatedly raised the issue in Parliament and urged the Government to strengthen hate crime legislation.
Mrs Hobhouse said: “We are seeing increasingly sophisticated forms of abuse, from AI-generated deepfake imagery and coordinated harassment campaigns to women being secretly filmed in public for entertainment and profit. We cannot continue playing catch-up forever while ignoring the hostility towards women that underpins so much of this behaviour.
“The Government has taken some welcome steps, including recognising misogyny as an aggravating factor in certain crimes. But it must go further.”
Mrs Hobhouse’s wider campaign against misogyny and technology-facilitated abuse has also recently gained support within her party. Liberal Democrat members voted at their autumn conference to back calls for tougher laws to criminalise the covert filming of women and girls and introduce new safeguards for recording smartglasses.
Mrs Hobhouse said recognising misogyny as a hate crime would help authorities better understand the scale of abuse, ensure offences motivated by hostility towards women are properly recognised and investigated, and acknowledge that many women’s experiences are part of a wider pattern rather than isolated incidents.
Photographer Jess Taylor