Police receive 200 reports about candidate safety

Almost 200 reports were made to police over parliamentary candidate safety in less than three weeks during the general election campaign.

Around half of the 198 reports made between November 15 and December 4 were serious enough to be treated as crimes, the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) told the PA news agency.

Most of the incidents were allegations of malicious communications online.

There were also reports of criminal damage and harassment.

Three were reports of assaults against campaign volunteers but none against parliamentary hopefuls and the incidents were not thought to be serious.

A third of reports came from campaign volunteers and staff, with the remainder coming from candidates themselves, the NPCC said.

The body said it had not seen trends of abuse being directed against any one particular party.

The NPCC said around half of all incidents related to malicious communications– and most of those do not meet the criminal threshold, .

It could not say what action was taken on the incidents which police established were crimes or which forces the reports were made to. PA has contacted all UK police forces requesting further information.

The figures come after all UK police forces were told to offer election candidates security briefings in a bid to protect them from being attacked while on the campaign trail.

A senior officer was assigned in each force to oversee the pla.