Arrests are not only solution to stopping attacks, boss of new unit says

YORKSHIRE’S BIGGEST police force has admitted arrests are not enough to stop widespread violence.

West Yorkshire Police launched its Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) yesterday, vowing to work with community projects educating young people, preventing the spread of gang and drugfuelled violence. Louise Hackett, Director of the VRU, told a launch conference in Leeds that “we can’t arrest our way out of this issue”.

While reports of violent crime have dropped in the past year, West Yorkshire remains one of the worst-affected areas for knife crime in England and county lines drugs gangs are a major issue for its police.

The force has been given £3.37m from the Home Office to spend on its VRU, part of which will be spent funding grassroots projects which work with young people at risk of being exploited by criminals.

The funding follows £4.02m in ‘surge’ money granted to the force last year, while Home Secretary Priti Patel promised further funding last week to the force to continue its enforcement work.

The conference heard from a number of previous offenders, young people in local schools and community project leaders, all of whom are working with police to infiltrate the bottom of the ‘crime food chain’ and prevent lives being ruined.

Mark Burns-Williamson, West Yorkshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner, said: “The VRU will not just focus on high-risk individuals, but look at how we can tackle the causes of youth violence.

“Public health approaches start from the principle that prevention is better than cure.”

Superintendent Damon Solley, Violence Reduction Lead at West Yorkshire Police, said: “The ongoing funding from the Home Office will ensure that we are able to deploy dedicated resources to target serious violence and knife crime.”