Funding for intervention services to prevent young people getting drawn into anti-social behaviour is key to tackling knife crime, a police boss has said.
Northumbria Police and Crime Commissioner Kim McGuinness said cuts to key services are ‘making matters worse’.
Grants from central Government to local authorities have fallen dramatically in the last 12 years, meaning council chiefs have been forced to make tough decisions about which services to maintain.
Funding for youth workers are now a fraction of what they were a decade ago and Ms McGuinness has said this must change to prevent young people being drawn into anti-social behaviour and knife crime.
She has spoken out in response to two mothers, Zoey McGill and Tanya Brown, who are campaigning for action after their 18-year-old sons, Jack and Connor, were murdered.
Two weeks ago, 14-year-old Tomasz Oleszak died after a suspected stabbing in Gateshead.
Ms McGuiness said: “Every time a young life gets taken too soon I hope it will be the last time, that the message of not carrying a knife will break through.
“But here we are hearing the desperate campaigning of parents who have had their children violently taken away.
“That’s why I set up the Violence Reduction Unit here in Northumbria, to fight violent crime through prevention.
“Nothing will bring their loved ones back but we can’t give up on trying to stop this devastation from happening again.
“Mentoring, youth diversion schemes and early interventions are key; but there is always so much more that could be done, more kids to engage with, more lives to change.”
Northumbria Police recorded 918 incidents of knife crime in the year leading up to March with six murders, seven attempted murders, 101 threats to kill involving a knife and 490 stabbings.
Ms McGuiness said: “Cuts to youth services, benefits and police numbers combined with a cost-of-living crisis will only make matters worse in the fight against crime.
“We can’t afford to fail our kids, we can’t leave a generation exposed to crime and we can’t accept there will be more victims.
“I want to be able to really scale up our prevention work and I want a properly funded police force to be out there policing our streets too.
“Together, this is how we drive crime down and this is how we will not only improve lives but we save them.”
Figures released by Durham County Council show the authority’s budget for youth services in 2016-17 was £1,011,562.
Two years later it was £44,853 and in the last financial year it was 42,356.
Recent figures from the Office for National Statistics show, up to the year ending March 2022, Durham Constabulary, recorded 300 serious incidents of knife crime.
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There was a murder, four attempted murders, 42 threats to kill involving a knife and 187 stabbings.
County Durham’s Police and Crime Commissioner Joy Allen said: “The impact of knife crime has long-term consequences for victims, their families, and our community.
“By carrying a weapon, you are not only putting others at risk of serious danger, but also yourself.
“We need to educate young people of the horrendous consequences that can go alongside carrying a knife.”
Ms Allen said Durham Constabulary has the lowest level of knife crime of any county force in the country, but, she said, even one incident of this type of crime is one too many.
She said: “More needs to be done to ensure that the regions of our country that are currently suffering the pressure and devastation associated with knife crime can deter these crimes in the future.
“We need to educate young people of the horrendous consequences that can go alongside carrying a knife.
“Officers at our force have already started to make strides in this area by carrying out education programmes in schools in our area to advise the next generation of the dangers posed by knives.”
Police now carry out test purchase operations to prevent knives falling into the hands of children.
There is a weeklong national amnesty campaign every May, as part of Operation Sceptre, which aims to reduce the number of bladed weapons that could be used in crime on our streets.
‘Knife bins’ are placed across the area for people to deposit weapons, ornamental knives, or bladed articles they no longer have any use for or are now illegal due to changes in the law.
Ms Allen said: “Removal and education of this kind of weapons is vital in ensuring our communities are protected from these terrible crimes in the future.
“The publics cooperation in being alert to spotting and reporting issues with bladed weapons will help make a real change in eradicating knife crime from our towns and cities nationally.”
In the Cleveland force area, over the same period, out of 794 incidents, there were two murders, two attempted murders, 47 threats to kill involving a knife and 490 stabbings.
Cleveland Police and Crime Commissioner Steve Turner said: “Every life lost to knife crime is one too many.
“Every death, injury or even imprisonment due to knife crime causes a huge ripple effect across the community. The impact cascades from the immediate effects felt by the victim and perpetrator to their family and friends, the emergency services, who respond to the incident, and then to the entire community, who have to live with the consequences of an offenders’ actions.
“While we need consequences for people who choose to carry weapons, tough enforcement and sentencing is not a catch-all when it comes to reducing levels of violence.
“We need to get upstream of this problem and educate children from their early years about the consequences of carrying – and using – knives. There’s also an important piece of work to be done to support parents, carers and family members to prevent young people becoming involved in violent crime.”
Mr Turner is working with the Chris Cave Foundation, which was set up Theresa Cave to combat knife crime following death of her beloved son, Chris, who died after he was fatally stabbed in Redcar in 2003.
He was 17.
Almost 20 year later the Cleveland force area is Britain’s second knife crime capital, second only to West Midlands Police.
Alarming new figures make the areas around Middlesbrough, Stockton, Hartlepool and Redcar and Cleveland the second most dangerous places in the UK for knife crime.
There were 139 knife offences in the area per 100,000 of the population, more than the number recorded by London’s Metropolitan Police at 124 or Greater Manchester at 128.
Mr Turner said: “The Cleveland Unit for the Reduction of Violence will bring more projects aimed at diverting more young people from serious violence, helping to prevent serious crime and protect those most vulnerable to becoming victims of serious violence.
“We are already working with young people most at-risk of becoming violent offenders via innovative schemes like Youth Triage. Such schemes help us to address their underlying issues and help them see that they are worth a better and brighter future.
“That’s why myself and my team are asking for the Government to put legislation in place to strengthen the PCC’s role in bringing together local partners and monitoring their progress as part of the Serious Violence Duty.
“We are also asking for more support and training for all involved in putting together strategies to combat serious violence locally so they can be as effective as possible in delivering real results when the duty is brought in next year.”
Read next:
- Powerful video shows County Durham mum singing to her murdered son on death bed
- Mum of murdered Aycliffe teen shares her feelings as Houghton Feast returns
- Aycliffe mum of Jack Woodley is 'heartbroken' after Tomasz Oleszak stabbing
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