Following the deaths of two teenagers over the weekend, Home Secretary Sajid Javid has stated that there is “no single solution” to the rising problem of knife crime and youth violence.
Over the weekend, two 17-year-olds were killed in knife attacks. Jodie Chesney was killed in London as she played music with friends and Yousef Ghaleb Makkie was attacked in the village of Hale Barns.
In response to this former Met Police Commissioner Lord Hogan-Howe called for a knife crime tsar to take charge of tackling the nationwide crisis.
While Prime Minister Theresa May has been accused by the Police Federation of England and Wales of being “delusional” with her claims that there is “no direct correlation” between rising knife crime and police numbers.
Lord Hogan-Howe disagreed, arguing that with the £1 billion of extra funding heading police recruitment of the next year should be used to make a difference, saying that there should be visible responses to knife crime with more officers on the street.
The Lord went on to say that in order to see action, knife crime must be treated as crisis:
“What [the Government] has not got is a catalyst to pull it together. It needs a leader who will say day after day, what are the police doing, what are the other agencies doing, how can we get the charities to work together.
“If it’s not treated as a crisis, it will take another two years before we see action.”
He went on to talk about the issue of knife culture becoming normalised:
“It looks like there are more people who are worried to be caught without a knife than they are to be caught with one.”
According to statistics put together by The Guardian ten teenagers have been killed in knife attacks since the beginning of the year.
Five were victims from London, three from Birmingham, one from Manchester and another passed away in Sunderland.
The home secretary condemned the “senseless violence”, stating that “It can’t go on.”
