‘It's not racist to ask who is committing rapes' says broadcaster Alex Phillips
'People are terrified of not just being called racist, but being told they're making inciteful or inflammatory comments, particularly if those comments are made online.'
On the latest Planet Normal podcast, which you can listen to using the audio player above, columnists Liam Halligan and Allison Pearson speak to broadcaster and journalist Alex Phillips about her documentary for the think-tank, The New Culture Forum , 'Heresies, Britain's Silent Rape Explosion'.
In her documentary, Phillips uses figures provided through Freedom of Information requests to better understand who the perpetrators of sexual assaults are. As she explains, the data was not always easy to acquire: ' When you appeal to police forces to ask for breakdowns of crimes by nationality, very often they will tell you we record that data on the victims, but we don't record that data on the perpetrators.
'Across European big cities, and capital cities that have bigger populations of immigrant communities, you see the statistics leap up, with two thirds of all incidents of women being attacked are being carried out by people who have come into the country.'
Fearing the threat to women and girls will only increase, Alex does not think politicians are doing enough.
'They're too lily-livered to take any affirmative action. And so the only thing they can do is attack anybody trying to whistleblow on the issue, to try and essentially bury it and not make matters worse by provoking further outrage.'
Planet Normal, a weekly Telegraph podcast featuring news and views from beyond the bubble. Listen on the audio player above or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your preferred podcast app.
Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
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