“My slight concern would be that the police move on their own,” he said.

“It’s whether the criminal justice system from its end to end would respond to it. So that’s a bigger debate than me.”

“I think the time is right to consider it,” he added, saying he hoped it would encourage women to report crimes. 

“Hopefully that is an indication to victims that it’s more reason to come forward and more reason to believe that the criminal justice system will take them seriously,” he said.

Last year Nottingham police revealed that they investigated a case of misogyny every three days during July and August and said women were calling its helpline to explicitly ask that a crime be recorded as a sexist hate crime. 

Several other forces are believed to be monitoring the pilot with a view to introducing similar schemes if it is successful. 

In 2015 the rules were expanded to give anti-Muslim hate crimes their own category, bringing them in line with anti-Semitic attacks. 

The most recent figures show that in total 80,393 hate crimes were recorded in 2016-17 compared to 62,518 in 2015-16, the most significant increase since the Home Office began recording figures in 2011-12.