UK Railway Assault Reports Hit a Record: What's Behind the Rise?

Reported assaults on Great Britain's railways rose to almost 25,000 incidents in 2025-26, a record high.

The Office of Rail and Road, the rail regulator, said 13,464 of those were assaults against passengers and members of the public on the mainline railway. That was 36% higher than the year before and the highest since records began in 2004, according to data published on 24 September 2026 The Guardian.

Two offence types explain most of the rise. Harassment, meaning threatening or abusive behaviour that does not always involve physical contact, rose 52% in a year. Common assault, which covers minor physical attacks or threats of immediate harm, rose 30%.

Assaults on rail staff also increased. Reports rose 12% in a year to 11,289 incidents. That included nearly 2,500 physical assaults, about seven per day.

Counting rules shape the total. The ORR said one incident can be counted twice, for both harassment and common assault. It is similar to counting both a foul and a yellow card for the same tackle in football. Assaults on staff are now recorded even if there is no physical injury. The difference is clear on London Underground, which counts each incident once. There, assaults on staff fell slightly last year.

The figures extend a longer rise in recorded railway offences. In July 2017, the ORR's annual health and safety report recorded 5,011 assaults by British Transport Police on trains and stations. That year harassment rose 45% from 2015-16 and common assault rose 20%. The ORR's 2021-22 report recorded two workforce fatalities in the year.

Passenger use has also recovered strongly. There were 1.83 billion journeys between April 2025 and March 2026, according to the ORR Rail Business Daily. Police data for 2023 had already shown a gap between use and offences. Police recorded nearly 10% more railway assaults than in 2019 before the pandemic, even with 11% fewer passengers BBC. The ORR separately reported that rail fares across Great Britain were unchanged in 2026.

The broader context here is how much of the 2025-26 increase reflects reporting and how much reflects risk. More journeys mean more exposure to incidents. New recording rules for staff and double-counting of harassment and common assault will lift headline totals even without the same change in behaviour.

In my view, the disaggregated figures are more instructive than the combined total of almost 25,000. The 36% rise for passengers and the public, the 52% rise in harassment, and about seven physical assaults on staff per day point to pressure on frontline staff and on policing and prosecution capacity. For operators, the questions are staffing, training, body-worn video, reporting channels and late-night services. For the ORR and British Transport Police, the questions are consistency of recording, enforcement outcomes and whether prevention is keeping pace with demand.