KNIFEMAN STABS FOUR
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.
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.
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.
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.