RAPE attacks are increasing rapidly in England and Wales, but the number of cases that end in a successful prosecution has fallen to a record low.

According to government figures published yesterday,only one in eighteen rapes reported to police ends with the suspect being punished, although government ministers have pledged to increase the number of convictions.

At the same time an alarming new rape trend is emerging, linked to the night-time binge-drinking culture in towns and cities across England and Wales.

According to a study by the Home Office, groups of predatory men are now targeting drunken women to rape and sexually assault. Jo Lovett, one of the authors, said: “There are people who are undoubtedly targeting women who are drunk.”

The link between excessive and heavy drinking and rape is now considered to be much more important and common than sexual attacks involving the drug Rohypnol.

The rise in sex crime and the link with heavy drinking comes as the Government faces a general election where it is on the defensive over the increase in violent crime and drunken behaviour on the streets.

The report, published by the Home Office yesterday, disclosed the latest rape figures and that some men are now trawling bars looking for drunk women to rape. It also estimated that the actual number of rapes in England and Wales is more than four times higher than the 11,700 reported to the police in 2002.

It is the fall in the conviction rate to 5.6 per cent which will cause most disappointment to the Government, Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and police. They have succeeded in encouraging more and more women to come forward to report rape but still too many cases never get into court.

With ministers already anxious over the likely consequences of relaxing the licensing laws to allow round-the-clock drinking, the Government will be concerned that alchohol is three times more associated with rape than drugs.

The Home Office report said that it had found “a group of predatory men who target women when they are drunk, so drunk in a number of cases that their capacity to consent had to be impaired”.

Ms Lovett, a researcher at the London Metropolitan University, said: “I think it is a pattern of drinking behaviour where a group go to a bar and offer to buy drinks or get chatting with girls or women and assume that some kind of sexual activity can be taken for granted. Alcohol is the lubricant in the process.”

The Government has overhauled the sex laws and changed the definition of consent in rapes cases in the hope that it will increased the conviction rate. But the law only came into effect last May and there are no figures available to see if the downward trend is being reversed.

The report also suggests that many women find it difficult to persuade police to take their complaint seriously and that others remain concerned at going into court where they may have to face the alleged rapist and relive the ordeal.

The report found that only 14 per cent of cases reached the trial stage, with the highest proportion of cases dropping out of the criminal justice system at an early stage.

The study tracked 3,500 rape cases through the courts and interviewed 228 rape victims. It found that police and the CPS overestimated the number of false allegations which feed into a “culture of scepticism” about rape complaints.

In some cases police and the CPS put emphasis only on the discrediting features of allegations. The study said that there remained a belief among some people working in the criminal justice system that many complaints were false, with victims blamed for risk-taking.

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