because of a funding shortage. Glasgow and Clyde Rape Crisis has launched an urgent appeal to raise more money in the next four weeks. It comes amid a series of protests about cuts to similar services across the country when the number of sexual crimes recorded here reached its highest since the 1970s.

BBC Scotland leading off today, as often before, with a story not fully worked out on its webpage so we cannot check its accuracy and sources. There is, of course, no rape story across the other BBC broadcasts or websites, despite higher rape offences reported in each of them.

Here’s a good reason.

Recorded rape offences are increasing dramatically in Scotland [3 229 in 2025/2026] though it is worth noting that they were down last year in Glasgow [from 492 to 486].

The recorded rape offence rate in Glasgow is only slightly higher at 7 per 10 000, compared to 6 per 10 000.

https://www.gov.scot/publications/recorded-crime-scotland-2025-26/documents/

The 2025/2026 equivalent data for England and Wales will not be published until March 2027.

The population of England & Wales – 62 million is 11.27 times the population of Scotland, 5.5 million, so all things being equal you might expect recorded rape offences in the former to be around 36 million [11.27 times 3 229] but it’s 74.7 million, more than twice as high!

Now, to the funding of crisis centres in Scotland, with less than half the rape offence rate.

This is not directly comparable because England’s funding is, apparently, more narrowly ring-fenced for specialist rape and sexual abuse support services (counselling, trauma-informed support, etc.) for survivors.

However, at face value and, of course, affected by the much higher rate of recorded offences, an AI estimate is:

Jurisdiction	Estimated specialist sexual violence pot	Approx. per capita
Scotland (DES share)	~£4.5–6.5 million	~£0.80–£1.20
England & Wales (RASASF only)	~£21 million	~£0.34

So, with caveats I accept, it looks like higher funding – 2 to 3 times – in Scotland with half the crime rate.