Susan Williams, the Home Office minister for countering extremism, told the committee that extremism generally had not increased, but there had been a rise in specific types of hate crime.

She said: “I’ve been speaking to our hate crime lead, and there’s been a 21% uptick in hate incidents against the IC4 and IC5 community.”

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Incidents of hate crime against Chinese people in the UK have been well-documented in the run up to and during the lockdown period, including individuals being spat on and assaulted.

Lady Williams’s answer jars with information provided by another Home Office minister, Kit Malthouse, in answer to a parliamentary question from the Liberal Democrats about the proportion of hate crime incidents against people of Chinese ethnicity.

Source: Anti-Asian hate crimes up 21% in UK during coronavirus crisis