WOLF whistling could soon be made a hate crime.

A trial has taken place in Nottinghamshire in which it recorded incidents such as wolf whistling, street harassment, verbal abuse and taking photographs without consent as a hate crime.

Other police forces are said to have expressed an interest in following the county's lead.

It is aimed at tackling misogynistic behaviour, defined by officers as "behaviour targeted towards women by men simply because they are a woman".

Assistant chief constable Mark Hamilton, spokesman on hate crime at the National Police Chiefs’ Council, said he believed police were ‘going to take this forward’ during a meeting of the Commons’ women and equalities committee.

Conservative MP Maria Miller, who chairs the committee, said there had been "significant and growing concern over the past few years about routine sexism and sexual harassment that women and girls experience in their daily lives".