POLICE in England and Wales recorded 17% more hate crime in 2017/18 than the previous year, official figures show.

There were 94,098 of the offences in total, three-quarters of which - 71,251 - were race hate crimes.

Data from the Home Office showed that there were 11,638 (12%) crimes triggered by sexual orientation; 8,336 (9%) where religion was a factor; 7,226 (8%) motivated because of someone's disability; and 1,651 (2%) were transgender hate crimes.

Some offences are classed more than once because they have more than one motivation.

The number of hate crimes according to police figures has more than doubled since 2012/13 from 42,255 to 94,098.

This is partly because of improvements in the way crimes are recorded but there have been spikes after events such as the Brexit referendum and the terrorist attacks last year.

Findings from the separate Crime Survey for England and Wales, which tracks the public's experience of crime, indicate a drop of 40% in hate crime incidents in the past decade.