Huge increase in numbers of children with stab wounds

It is young black men who are dying on the streets of London. We can take back control of our communities

THE number of children being admitted to hospitals in England with stab wounds is up 86 per cent in four years, statistics show. NHS figures reveal a big rise in the number of people receiving treatment for assault by a sharp object – most commonly a knife.

More than 5,000 stabbing victims were admitted to hospitals in England, according to the most recent figures analysed by the BBC, up 14 per cent for the same time period last year and a rise of 40 per cent on four years ago.

The number of children treated has climbed by 86 per cent since 2014, as it emerged that the average age of knife attack victims is getting younger. More than one in 10 of the 5,000 treated for stab wounds in England last year were under the age of 18.

Of those, more than 50 were children aged between 10 and 14 years old, and four were under nine. Among them was Mylee Billingham, 8, who was killed by William Billingham, her father, at his home in Walsall in January.

The figures come amid a surge in London knife crime, which Mayor Sadiq Khan conceded would take a decade to solve. Earlier this month the total number of murders in the capital surpassed that for the whole of 2017.

How do we solve a problem like the knife-crime epidemic, which is now spreading from London to other parts of the UK? Each morning, I dread scrolling through social media, worried that I’ll be reading about another young – usually black – boy lost, and about more young boys who are “involved” being intimidated into silence.

These murders prompt debate about police numbers, stop and search, and youth activities, and all of these are important in dealing with the terrible violence on our streets. But can we even talk about stopping knife crime without acknowledging the elephant in the room? Why is it that young black boys are the ones dying?

The question is close to my heart. I grew up poor, without a father, in west London, surrounded by too much crime. I watched my friends rolling out to fight with boys from other areas. And I’ve spent more than 20 years as a youth and community worker trying to keep boys away from making mistakes that will cost them their lives.

There is no simple answer. But the one thing I do know is that we need to stop the killing now. Not in 10 years’ time, or a generation, as London’s Mayor, Sadiq Khan, said recently. And it is going to take all of us to do it. It’s not just the job of the police, or the families of the boys involved in violent crime, or youth workers, or teachers, or the Mayor of London, or the Home Office. It’s about our collective will.

Because the forces lined up against the young boys caught up in the current mess are too great for them to handle alone. They just don’t have the support. Their families are too often broken, and their adopted families – the gangs running the drug networks – are brutal, vicious people, pack animals hunting out the vulnerable in our poor communities.

We have to reduce the supply of young men and the demand for the gangs’ product. We’re never going to beat the thugs while wealthier people in the posher or gentrifying parts of town are putting cocaine up their noses. We’re not going to beat it without poorer addicts getting treatment. We’re not going to beat it without communities feeling safe thanks to a regular police presence. We’re not going to beat it without positive role models for young people. We’re not going to beat it without friends, relatives and neighbours showing young boys that they care. And that caring must start at home.

Because my father was absent for long stretches, it was my mother who moved heaven and earth to keep me safe. She put the fear of God into me. But not every child has that blessing. Parents are working harder than ever just to get by. But that’s no excuse; men with children need to be fathers first, and everything else second. If you don’t do your job with your child then your child is going to be faced with the same mess you’re dealing with, only worse. Because the problems that were around me as a young man are worse now.

Yes, the Government can help, but there is no knight in shining armour on the horizon. Another batch of coppers – as I’ve put together a plan for – will help, but they won’t win the day. It will have to be us, in the community trenches, doing the hard work of teaching our children that being a big man means having an education and a job. Or telling them that only one in a million will make it as a footballer or musician, but everyone can put in an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay. More importantly, teaching them there is true honour in that life, not the false honour of the fear that dealers and criminals demand as “respect”.

Communities must defeat the criminals’ fear with honour. We are the majority, not the criminals. And absolutely no one wants this killing going on in their areas. The neighbourhoods affected by violent crime will support tools such as stop and search, if the police work with them to do it in an appropriate and respectful way.

The most disappointing thing in Mr Khan’s response to the rampant criminality on our streets has been the total lack of urgency. Even if central government doesn’t have more money to give, there are things we can do. We can still shout and make ourselves heard. We can be visible. We can take back control of our communities.