Knife crime must be treated like an infectious disease killing our children, Theresa May and Sajid Javid say today.
Unveiling a radical shift in policy, the Prime Minister and Home Secretary will hand hospitals, schools and social services a legal duty to protect youngsters.
Casualty staff and GPs will be obliged to flag up knife wounds or other suspicious injuries so children can be referred to ‘violence reduction units’. Mentoring and education will be used to stop them being dragged into crime and the gang culture.
Teachers and social workers will also be obliged to report danger signs such as truancy and serious misbehaviour. The aim is to intervene ‘long before’ young people ever pick up a weapon.
The move comes amid intense public concern over knife crime. Ten separate stabbing incidents have been reported in the past few days, including one in which a hooded attacker knifed four victims at random during a 12-hour rampage in London.
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Police and emergency workers attend to the Brettenham Road stab victim - the last of four stabbings in Edmonton
Police were hunting for the knifeman after four people were stabbed in random attacks during a 12-hour north London rampage
Forensic teams work at the scene of the stabbing in Edmonton, London, following a spate of knife attacks
Police on the scene near Fore Street, Edmonton, London, near where a person was stabbed just a short distance from where a middle aged woman was knifed
Blood stains the pavement at the scene of a stabbing in Edmonton as a manhunt was underway for a hooded knifeman
The stabbings come after the 31st murder in London so far this year on Friday - and the 14th in March
Today, the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary will host a major Downing Street youth violence summit with experts, police chiefs and victims’ families.
In a joint article for the Mail, they say that the loss of lives is horrific, senseless and destructive.
‘This cannot be allowed to continue,’ they write. ‘We must and will use every tool and tactic at our disposal to deter young people from carrying knives. We must treat the threat which knives pose to our society like a disease.’
The new ‘public health’ approach will see Mr Javid launch a consultation today that would impose legal duties on public bodies such as schools and hospitals. It would be very similar to the system in Glasgow, formerly the knife crime capital of Europe, where stab wounds have halved in 12 years.
It also mirrors the anti-terrorism Prevent strategy, set up in 2006, which is used to identify youngsters at risk of being sucked into extremism.
Under the Glasgow model, gang members and those at risk of joining gangs are referred to violence reduction units. There, they are offered mentoring by someone with similar experiences of violence or given opportunities to further their education.
Under the Glasgow model, gang members and those at risk of joining gangs are referred to violence reduction units where they are offered mentoring by someone with similar experiences (stock image)
Doctors are invited into schools to show graphic images of knife wounds and pupils are also taught about the tough sentences for violent crimes.
A consultation on the new strategy will run for eight weeks and establish exactly how the system should work in England.
It will decide how doctors, teachers and social workers would report at-risk pupils and how to impose a legal duty on them to do so.
Violence reduction units already operate in London and the West Midlands but are expected to be expanded there and elsewhere.
In their article for the Mail. the Prime Minister and Home Secretary insist the new approach isn’t about ‘making excuses for criminals’ and anyone caught with a knife will be punished.
Theresa May at Church yesterday near her Maidenhead constituency
But they say the crisis cannot be dealt with by the criminal justice system alone: ‘We cannot try to simply arrest our way out of this situation, dealing with people only after they have broken the law.
‘After all, were it an infectious disease killing our children, you would not expect the authorities to just focus on treating the symptoms – you would rightly demand that we also do everything possible to prevent people getting ill at all.
‘The families of those who have lost loved ones – many of whom will be at the summit today – deserve no less.
‘The loss of a life to knife crime is horrific. It is senseless, destructive and a tragedy for the families, friends and communities of the victims.
‘It is a terrible truth that, disproportionately, it is young people whose lives are being lost in this way.’
Today’s serious youth violence summit will be attended by more than 100 experts including Met Police Commissioner Cressida Dick, the head of the NHS Simon Stevens and Baroness Newlove, the Victims’ Commissioner for England and Wales.
Her husband Garry was beaten to death by a gang vandalising his car in 2007.
Figures last month showed that the number of under-16s taken to A&E with stab wounds had doubled in five years, to 347 admissions in 2017/18 up from 180 in 2012/13.
As part of the new strategy, Mr Javid this weekend announced that police would be given new stop and search powers to tackle the rise in knife crime.
Sajid Javid with Metropolitan Police Deputy Commissioner Steve House during a visit to Angel underground station on Thursday to announce plans to allow more police officers enhanced stop and search powers
Officers in seven force areas including London and the West Midlands will be allowed to carry out checks without needing to prove they have reasonable grounds.
Mr Javid added: ‘Violent crime is like a disease rotting our society and it’s essential that all public bodies work together to treat the root causes.’
Figures obtained by Channel 4’s Dispatches last month showed that the number of child knife killers had risen 77 per cent in two years with teenage knife robberies up by 50 per cent.
We need a new way to treat the sickness of knife violence, write THERESA MAY and SAJID JAVID
by Theresa May and Sajid Javid
The loss of a life to knife crime is horrific. It is senseless, destructive and a tragedy for the families, friends and communities of the victims.
It is a terrible truth that, disproportionately, it is young people whose lives are being lost in this way.
This cannot be allowed to continue. We must and will use every tool and tactic at our disposal to deter young people from carrying knives.
We must treat the threat which knives pose to our society like a disease.
So this week we are bringing together experts from many different disciplines for a serious youth violence summit at 10 Downing Street.
The aim is to get people from right across society – not just politicians and police officers, but figures from education, healthcare and social work, religious and community leaders, youth workers and more – working side by side to spot young people at risk, flag their concerns, and make targeted interventions to steer them away from crime.
Rather than having a complex web of different agencies and organisations working independently on different parts of the problem, we want to see everyone working together in what has been called a public health approach.
Because youth violence is an issue that affects us all, and the only way to beat it is for us all to work together.
Not just dealing with the tragic aftermath when someone has been stabbed, but intervening long before.
Responding to the early signs of worrying behaviour or problems at home, or stopping teenagers being groomed by ruthless gangs, so that a young person doesn’t pick up a knife in the first place.
We are today launching a consultation into a legal duty that will underpin the multi-agency, public health approach, an approach that builds on work we are already doing to stop crime before it happens. For example, we’re putting an extra £100million into law enforcement in the worst-affected areas, getting more police on the frontline and setting up Violence Reduction Units. And our new £200million Youth Endowment Fund will provide long-term investment for programmes that steer young people away from becoming involved in violent crime or reoffending.
This approach is not making excuses for criminals. Responsibility for knife crime lies with the perpetrators, and anyone even considering arming themselves with a blade should be under no illusions: if you carry a knife you will be caught, and you will be punished.
The police are already catching and prosecuting more people who carry a knife – and the courts are sending more of those convicted to prison for longer.
Yesterday, we announced that we will be piloting changes to stop and search, which will initially apply in areas particularly affected by violent crime: London, the West Midlands, Merseyside, South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, South Wales and Greater Manchester.
Our new Offensive Weapons Bill will make it harder for criminals to arm themselves. And almost £1billion of extra police funding is being made available this year, so that local forces have the resources they need.
But while strong, effective law enforcement has an obvious and vital role to play, we cannot try to simply arrest our way out of this situation, dealing with people only after they have broken the law.
After all, were it an infectious disease killing our children, Mail readers would not expect the authorities to just focus on treating the symptoms – you would rightly demand that we also do everything possible to prevent people getting ill at all. The families of those who have lost loved ones – many of whom will be at the summit today – deserve no less.
Of course, nothing we say or do this week will bring back the children who were so cruelly taken from them.
But we can promise that we will do whatever it takes to confront and defeat the scourge of youth violence.
And that we will do everything in our power to stop more families suffering as they have suffered.
photo link
https://textbacklinkexchanges.com/theresa-may-reveals-public-health-approach-to-tackle-violence-after-thug-stabs-four-random-people/
News Photo Theresa May reveals 'public health' approach to tackle violence after thug stabs four random people
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