A senior Tory MP is pressing the Government to make public Sexual Harassment a specific criminal offence as a new poll suggested two in five women have been groped in public.
Caroline Nokes, the chair of the Women and Equalities Select Committee, said changing the law would send a ‘really powerful message’.
Backing calls to bring forward the new offence, she told the BBC: ‘It will give women the confidence to report and sends a very clear message to perpetrators that this is criminal.’
A YouGov survey for the BBC, published on International Women’s Day, found 43 per cent of women in the UK have suffered groping or unwelcome touching in public.
Meanwhile, almost a third – 28 per cent – said they had experienced indecent exposure in public and two thirds (66 per cent) said they did not feel safe walking alone at night.
Caroline Nokes, the chair of the Women and Equalities Select Committee, said changing the law would send a ‘really powerful message’
Ms Nokes has repeatedly called on the Government to bring forward the new offence.
Writing for The Mirror last week, the Conservative backbencher said she believed ‘now is the time to make misogyny a hate crime’.
However, she said she recognised that the Law Commission had recently recommended that misogyny should not be classed as a hate crime.
But the organisation had recommended that the Government explore creating a new separate, non-hate crime, public sexual harassment offence.
Ms Nokes said: ‘I do not believe the Government can pick and choose, you either agree with the Law Commission’s recommendations in their entirety (I do) or reject them entirely, you cannot have it both ways.’
She said ministers ‘need to crack on and make PSH a crime, sending a powerful message to women and girls that they are on their side, and to perpetrators that they are not just a nuisance, they’re criminals’.
Ms Nokes last year accused Boris Johnson’s father, Stanley Johnson, of touching her inappropriately.
She told Sky News that in 2003 Mr Johnson had smacked her ‘on the backside about as hard as he could’.
Asked about the claim, Mr Johnson had said he had ‘no recollection’ of Ms Nokes.
Ministers said in February this year that they will make new laws to make public sexual harassment a crime if it is ‘clear’ that they are needed.
Home Office minister Rachel Maclean said the Government would bring forward a law to criminalise catcalling, pressing against someone in a sexual manner on public transport, making lewd comments or other inappropriate behaviour, only if a review proves it is required.
The Government has been examining the issue as part of the passage of its Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill.
