Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Offensive Weapons) (Amendment, Surrender and Compensation) Order 2024

Thursday 18th April 2024 Grand Committee

Considered in Grand Committee

13:00

Moved by

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom]

That the Grand Committee do consider the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Offensive Weapons) (Amendment, Surrender and Compensation) Order 2024.

Relevant document: 12th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee (special attention drawn to the instrument)

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Sharpe of Epsom) (Con)]

My Lords, the order before us adds zombie-style knives and zombie-style machetes to the list of prohibited offensive weapons, by amending the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Offensive Weapons) Order 1988 to include them. The purpose of this draft order is to maintain public safety by restricting the supply of weapons which can be used in violent crime or to create fear in our communities. The Government keep legislation in relation to prohibited offensive weapons under review and we will act when the police raise concerns about specific weapons. For example, zombie knives were banned in England and Wales in 2016, followed by cyclone knives in 2019.

We are now concerned about the availability of certain types of machetes and large outdoors knives, which do not seem to have a practical use and instead appear designed to look menacing. The police tell us that these bladed articles, which can be purchased for as little as £10, are favoured by those who want to use them as weapons to perpetrate violent crime. While sales of these weapons are relatively low, they have a disproportionate effect because their appearance creates a fear of and glamorises violence.

We are aware that machetes and other large, bladed tools such as scythes, billhooks and large outdoor knives have traditionally been used as tools in farming, gardening, clearing land and waterways, as well as in outdoor activities such as bushcraft, hunting and camping. However, unlike more conventional knives and machetes, zombie-style knives and machetes have no legitimate purpose. In our conversations with manufacturers and retailers, they have been clear that, in their view, these articles are not designed as tools but as weapons. If these dangerous weapons remain available, there is a risk that they could be used to intimidate or cause fear. Worse, they could be used to perpetrate serious acts of violence. The Government will not tolerate such a risk.

This brings me to the details of the order before us. Under Section 141 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, it is an offence to possess, import, manufacture, sell, hire, offer for sale or hire, expose or possess for the purposes of sale or hire, a weapon specified in an order made under that section. An offence under Section 141 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 currently carries a maximum penalty of six months’ imprisonment, but we have introduced provisions in the Criminal Justice Bill to increase the maximum penalty to two years.

A number of descriptions of weapons have been specified under Section 141 and therefore prohibited, including butterfly knives, knuckledusters, telescopic truncheons and certain types of swords with curved blades, commonly known as samurai swords. Using the order-making powers in Section 141(2) of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, the Government wish to add zombie-style knives and zombie-style machetes to the list of offensive weapons to which Section 141 applies. These weapons are defined as a bladed article with a plain cutting edge, a sharp pointed edge, and a blade over eight inches in length. This length was chosen to exclude knives designed for legitimate purposes, such as many kitchen and outdoors knives. To be within the scope of the ban, the article should also have one or more of the features specified in Article 1(1)(a), namely, a serrated cutting edge, more than one hole in the blade, spikes, or more than two sharp points in the blade.

It is right that we take the firmest possible action to prevent violence and to stop dangerous weapons getting into the wrong hands, and we are not seeking to criminalise law-abiding citizens. There will therefore be defences to cover a range of circumstances, including where the article in question is one of historical importance, is made by hand, is possessed, sold or imported for religious purposes, or was given as a gift by a Sikh to another person at a religious ceremony or ceremonial event. Antiques are already exempted from Section 141 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988. Furthermore, we are providing a defence for blunt items to protect the fantasy knives market. We have also taken the opportunity to extend this defence to curved swords.

There are a couple of further points to mention before I finish. First, Parts 3 and 4 of this instrument are concerned with the surrender and compensation scheme, through which owners with weapons in scope of the ban will be able to surrender them and claim compensation if they so wish. Secondly, in terms of territorial scope, the statutory instrument will only apply to England and Wales. We very much hope that the devolved Administrations in Northern Ireland and Scotland will take similar action to ensure that these dangerous knives are prohibited across the United Kingdom. To this effect, officials have engaged with the Governments in both Northern Ireland and Scotland.

In summary, nothing matters more than public safety. That is why we are bringing forward this order, to prevent dangerous weapons being used in violent crime or to create fear in our communities. I beg to move.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I say thank you to the Minister and his Home Office team, which drafted this order, for including a clear and comprehensive exemption for objects of historical importance. Carving out a space for history is not the easiest thing to do when you are dealing with people being killed and seriously hurt but it is really important, and to have done it in a way that the ordinary citizen—rather than just museums—can take advantage of is particularly appreciated.

History is real. Iconoclasm is not a virtue. We have a long history of our ancestors carrying blades into armed conflicts, not just as weapons but as tools of utility and survival. Preserving these items is important. Museums have a limited capacity, so the role of preservation falls mostly on the amateur collector and the descendants of our brave veterans. I am delighted that the Government recognise that.

Historical knives do not play a significant role in crime—they are far too expensive for that—so excluding them from the order does not in any way decrease the protection that it offers. By way of illustration, it was not so long ago that a curved sword was sold for £400,000, possibly because it belonged to Lord Nelson. Generally, these articles fetch a decent price—far more than it costs to purchase a replica on the net or elsewhere.

Ministers have not always been so perspicacious. The historical importance exemption is not available for items prohibited by Section 141 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, so there are items from World War II—obviously, they are not 100 hundred years old yet—issued to, for instance, the commandos and their SOE, as well as to their equivalents in other nations, that are not protected. I very much hope that the Minister and his team will make a note on the file that this is something they might set right when next an opportunity occurs. We ought to preserve these objects for just the reasons that have motivated the exemption in this order.

I also believe that there is scope for clarifying the law on truncheons. As it is at the moment, I am not at all clear that the police practice of presenting long-serving officers with engraved, old-style truncheons is legal; it would be nice to know that it is. There is also some scope for looking through the guidance that the police use when applying these rather convoluted regulations on prohibited items, so that they really understand how the various descriptions and exemptions work and so that things are made clear and easy for them.

I look forward to further conversations on these matters, both directly and as a result of the Home Office’s most helpful interactions with both Bill Harriman of the British Association for Shooting and Conservation and John Pidgeon of the Coleshill Auxiliary Research Team.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

My Lords, in 2021-22, 282 people lost their lives to knife crime—the highest number of people killed with a knife in over 70 years. The biggest increase was among boys aged between 16 and 17, going from 10 in the previous year to 24. Approximately four in 10 of all homicides were committed using a knife or a sharp instrument—the highest annual total since the homicide index began in 1946. There were 69 homicides where the victim was a teenager; in around three-quarters of those, the method of killing was a knife or sharp instrument, compared with 41% of all homicides.

Campaigners have been calling for a ban on zombie knives for several years, but progress on achieving one has been slow and several high-profile incidents have occurred since it was promised. These include the tragic killing of 15 year-old Elianne Andam, who was stabbed on her way to school in Croydon in September with what was believed to be a large zombie knife.

Meanwhile, this is the Government’s third attempt at banning zombie weapons since 2016. Bizarrely, the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 banned zombie knives only if they had threatening words on the blade. This proved a major loophole. Can the Minister explain why this loophole was not addressed sooner? Where was the sense of urgency then and where is it now? This ban will not come into effect until September, by which time, tragically, more lives may have been lost.

The Policing Minister, Chris Philp, told BBC Radio 4’s “Today” programme that although some swords will come under the new rules, some will not qualify owing to the difficulty of differentiating between those that could be used for violence and those kept for historical or religious reasons. He said that

“a regular sword, like the sort a historic soldier might carry, would probably not qualify. It would depend on the design”.

Is this still the case? If so, why could these swords not be included, given the availability of the historical importance defence? In any case, is not a sword, historical or not, capable of being used in violence?

Reducing the circulation of these weapons is not just about bans and sentences, important though both are. It is about cracking down hard on the sale of knives and swords of all kinds. Campaigners rightly want tech companies to introduce safety measures to stop knives being advertised online, so can the Minister update us on the progress of the relevant measures included in the Online Safety Act? How many prosecutions have there been in this area so far and how has this been policed?

I also want to speak about youth services, which have been cut by 77% over the last decade, despite the fact there is overwhelming evidence to show that youth centre closures are closely linked to youth crime. In 2020, the APPG on knife crime focused on the impact of youth centre closures across the country and found that each reduction in the number of youth centres corresponded to an increase in knife crime. This trend is confirmed by recent work from the University of Warwick, which reviewed London youth centre provision and found that crime participation among 10 to 15 year-olds increased by 10% in those London boroughs affected most by youth centre closures between 2010 and 2019.

Increasing jail time and banning zombie knives are welcome to increase deterrence and give police more tools, but they do not address the reasons why children and young people are carrying knives in the first place. As the representative of a Bristol school that had lost two of its teenage pupils due to knife crime said:

“Halving knife crime will not be achieved by banning machetes or … zombie knives. You can kill someone with a knitting needle or a screwdriver. You’ve got to deal with the anger, the fire, the rage, the angst, the trauma inside the person”.


That goes to the heart of this, and I hope that the Minister, as well as answering my specific questions, will also address himself to that challenge, because this is about tackling not just knife crime but the causes of knife crime. The British public and so many grieving families are looking to the Government to do both.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

My Lords, I have only a few things to mention. I support the legislation. It is necessary for all the reasons that the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, went through in the statistics about violent crime, and because these weapons are terrifying. I am not sure that they are always the most effective weapon at times because they are the hardest to hide. There probably are more effective weapons, but for anybody who sees them, particularly in a public place or if it is repeated in social media, they are just terrifying. Any attempt to restrict their availability and possession is a good thing.

The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee raised a few questions about the process, but I did not think it was fair to make the point that only nine prosecutions may be expected next year. That does not mean that this type of knife would be used nine times if it remained on the non-prohibited list; it is clear that they are being used far more often and not only when the police are involved. There is a far bigger case than the nine prosecutions anticipated in the response of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. My question is, in part, about the compensation scheme and, in part, about the effectiveness of this part of the Bill.

13:15

First, the wholesalers and retailers of the knives are to be banned. I believe they could reasonably be expected to be given compensation, as could anybody who possesses one of these knives. My question is whether they will be compensated at wholesale or retail prices. Some may say that that is not relevant, but it could be, certainly to the impact of the cost of the scheme.

More importantly, wholesalers and retailers—at least, those based in the UK—must have a list of their recent sales. Have the police asked for a list of those people who have been sold to or could it be provided by the manufacturers, which I believe will ask for compensation? The impact statement suggests around 472 knives—or something of that order—might be received, which means that it is not an impossible task for the 43 police forces of England and Wales to get around, have a look and see whether the people who bought them in the last five years still have them. If they do not, who did they sell or give them to? The police could commit to that. As to the Minister’s point, they asked for this power, so it is not unreasonable to ask whether they could chase down a few of these things, which might be out there; otherwise, we are just waiting for them to be discovered after being used or by other forms of police intelligence.

My final point addresses the last point from the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, which is that it is not only the weapon that causes these problems. Collectively, we have never really had a proper campaign to ask the public to tell us who has these knives. Somebody always knows. It may be a mother, a brother or a member of a gang; they are all terrified. But we have not collectively reached out to the public and asked for that information. The police then need to commit to follow up and find the people who hold these knives. Could this be an opportunity?

The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee raised the point that this scheme would have to be marketed, not least because of the compensation. Could that opportunity be taken, perhaps in conjunction with a body such as Crimestoppers, to suggest that the information is brought forward and that the police will act on it—ideally when the person is carrying the knife, as opposed to when it is at home? That is the point at which action needs to be taken—it is an offensive weapon when it is being caried. This affects weapons that are made to be offensive, but it also includes the other two groups, which are intended or have been adapted to be offensive. It is vital to build the public into this campaign to make sure that they provide information and, as importantly, that the police follow up on it at a time when the person might be carrying these knives.

My final question is on the blunt defence, on which the material that I received does not have an awful lot of detail. Of course, something blunt could be made sharp, so I suppose the open question is: what prevents someone who has a blunt weapon sharpening it? A material that cannot be sharpened is one obvious answer; it could be fractured so that it is hard to sharpen. I would like to understand how something blunt could be prevented from being sharpened.

There is a similar challenge around firearms. Some imitation firearms can be converted, and a lot of work has gone into ensuring that that does not happen. My open question is what similar considerations have been taken on these weapons, which may be blunt but could be adapted later.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, we too welcome this SI. I will start with some questions for the Minister, then comment on other noble Lords’ contributions to the short debate.

First, what are the Government doing to increase prosecution rates for knife crime? Currently, fewer than half of those who come to police attention are actually prosecuted. Do the Government have any plans to introduce a new serious violence strategy, given that the existing strategy is five years old? What assessment have the Government made of the threat of so-called “ninja swords” and why are they not covered by this legislation? The Government, as we heard, have tried to ban zombie knives before but the retailers have adapted their designs to get past the laws. Are the Government confident that they have done enough to stop the same thing happening again this time?

Further, online knife sales represent a serious issue in terms of lack of supervision by the websites and the lack of regulation over online marketplaces hosting illegal knife sales, particularly when these websites are hosted overseas. Can the Minister say something about buying these types of knives from overseas websites, how they may be intercepted and the obligations put on the people running those websites?

I also want to acknowledge that I understand this is a difficult problem and do not want to score political points on this issue, but there is a wider strategy to be developed and adopted to try to cut down this scourge in our society. The noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, made an extremely good point when she drew the comparison between the cuts in youth services and the corresponding increase in knife crime. That really points to one of the sources of the problem that we have seen in recent years.

As an aside, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, that I am glad he made the points that he did. I agreed with those points and many families, including mine, have historical pieces which would certainly be illegal if they were sold nowadays in shops—so I thank him for that.

The noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, raised some detailed questions, which I thought were very interesting, about the practical steps that police forces can take to track down sales and do some proactive policing to see what has happened to the knives that have been sold legitimately over the last few years. Of course, a huge number have been sold illegitimately, but we understand that point.

In conclusion, I want to talk slightly more generally. As noble Lords may know, I sit as a youth magistrate and regularly see knife crime-related charges in both youth and adult courts. One of the things I always do in the youth court is make sure that the parent, responsible adult or elder sibling sees the knife, because very often the person who accompanies the young person in court does not really know the extent of the danger which may have been posed through carrying that knife. Whether it is the physical knife itself, which we sometimes see in court, or a picture of it, I always make sure that the responsible adult sitting next to the young person sees that object, so that they know what we are talking about.

The other thing I always do with the young person, however serious the knife-related offence is, is say to them that their own lives are in danger. What we regularly see in court is young people being attacked with their own knives when fights break out. Twice in the last five years, I have had young people not turning up to court for a knife offence because they themselves have been killed. This is why I say that to the young people in front of me; one can only hope that it drives the message home.

We need to say that it is gang-related or drug-related, of course, but a lot of these people will say that they carry these knives for their own defence. They are more frightened of the harm posed to them by other people carrying knives than they are by what the court can do to them by way of sanction. This is not to argue for higher sanctions, but it is to argue for education and better youth services, and for a wider intervention through schools and other youth programmes to try to bear down on this scourge.

The final point I want to make is that people often ask questions about racial disproportionality, with young black men attacking each other. In this House and elsewhere, you hear of people saying that the police are disproportionate in their response to this and in stopping and search young black people. I have certainly been in more than one meeting with black mothers who have said to me and to the people with me, “You’re not doing enough to protect our sons”. So we need to do more to protect their sons and we need a holistic approach to do that, but, as far as this SI goes, I support it.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions to this relatively short debate. I thank in particular the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, for his personal insights from his courtroom; they made a great deal of sense and, in some cases, were very disturbing. I have had similar conversations with some of those mothers; they are particularly relevant in the context of some of the debates on stop and search that we have had in this House. Perhaps we need to do more to publicise the results of some of these conversations.

I will do my utmost to address the questions asked of me. I will start by talking about the serious violence duty, which the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, asked me about, because that obviously informs the entire debate. In 2023-24, the Government allocated £13.1 million to continue the implementation and delivery of the serious violence duty; that followed a commitment made in January 2023. The noble Lord will remember that, through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, the serious violence duty requires a range of specified authorities—such as the police, local government, youth offending teams and health and probation services —to work collaboratively and put in place plans to prevent and reduce serious violence in their local communities, enabled by new powers to share both data and information. Of course, that Act also contains measures such as serious violence reduction orders as well as other things; it is probably a little too soon to tell precisely how effective those are but, obviously, they are in train.

Local areas have the flexibility to determine the geographical extent of their partnerships. We are encouraging local areas to use multiagency partnerships where possible. The point was made by both the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, and the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, that educational institutions, prisons and youth custodial institutions—known as “the relevant authorities”—are under separate duties. We expect them to co-operate with the core duty holders when asked as well. We also require partnerships to consult such institutions in their areas.

The fact is that this is a societal issue. We are not going to solve it this afternoon, but I have heard the points made and, of course, I will make sure that they are shared round the relevant parts of government—that is, most of government and most of society.

Both the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, and the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, asked me about ninja swords and other types of bladed articles that are used in crime. Concerns have been raised during the passage of the Criminal Justice Bill through Parliament in relation to swords, in particular so-called ninja swords. Those that have the features set out in this legislation will be banned; however, those that do not have those features will not be, because we have focused our efforts on the types of weapons that the National Police Chiefs’ Council has raised as being of particular concern.

As my noble friend Lord Lucas mentioned, many members of the public legitimately own antique swords and swords of historical interest. People also own modern swords as collectible items, and there are those who own swords for activities such as martial arts, fencing and re-enactment. Many British military swords have straight blades and are treasured by service personnel when they serve, as well as by their family members when they are passed on. These articles are generally owned and used responsibly, obviously.

The noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, is quite right about blunt blades. Something that is blunt can be sharpened. However, we have provided the defence of blunt items, which would enable collectors of fantasy knives to purchase for display items that would otherwise be prohibited. We are taking the opportunity to extend this defence to curved swords, as I have mentioned, but it is important to note that, if an item were sharpened, it would become illegal. If this comes to the attention of the police, they will be able to make a charge for unlawful possession of a bladed article if the blade is sharpened.

I also point out to the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, that the unfortunate and awful crime in Croydon that she mentioned was actually committed with a kitchen knife.

The statistics are not quite as bleak as the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, suggested. I am always a bit nervous talking about statistics in relation to what are individually horrific circumstances, so please bear that in mind when I mention them. The latest provisional admissions data for NHS hospitals in England and Wales showed a decrease in the number of admissions for assault with a sharp object in the year ending September 2023. The figure was 4% lower than in the year ending September 2022. We should also bear in mind that many of the comparisons that we make are with the years of Covid, when many people were locked up—metaphorically speaking—so they are not direct comparisons. If we compare like for like, the numbers are improving. That is not to say that they are not still awful, as I said, and obviously we have to do much more about that.

13:30

I thank my noble friend Lord Lucas for his very generous remarks, particularly for his remarks about my officials who, I may say, are excellent. I completely agree with my noble friend, and we do not praise our officials often enough. I also take note of his concerns and in fact I share one of them. As an ex-policeman, I have a truncheon, and I am slightly concerned that I may have just criminalised myself, so I need to work on that.

The noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, reflected on the Online Safety Act. Ofcom is currently consulting on the codes of practice that will provide clarity to tech companies on how it intends to monitor compliance with provisions in the Act, so it is too soon to tell on that.

The noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, asked about compensation because the SI, as he noted, contains provisions for the surrender of, and compensation for, offensive weapons. I apologise for the fact that that was not mentioned in the original Explanatory Memorandum; that was an oversight, and it has been corrected. The current design of the scheme is that we have adopted the same approach as for the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 surrender and compensation scheme. The standard level of compensation for that scheme was set out following consultation with weapons experts from the Royal Armouries. Looking at the current prices for zombie-style knives, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, we believe that £10 remains about right.

The noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, talked about the number of prosecutions. Obviously, I do not yet know how many we can expect as it is impossible to forecast. What I would say is that the supply of these knives will also be constrained because Border Force officers are experts in intercepting these sorts of banned items, as they have proved with others. The supply will become constrained but, of course, as we have noted already, other types of knives are available that are difficult or impossible to ban. The guidance will be published in June and much more detail on how the police will enforce the new regs will obviously become available then.

I think I have answered the questions. We keep offensive weapons legislation under review. We always seek to strike the correct balance between targeting criminals and respecting the activities of law-abiding citizens, but our abiding concern has to be the protection of the public, so by restricting the supply of zombie-style weapons, we are acting in service of that critical aim. The order before us is a proportionate, sensible measure that will further strengthen the Government’s efforts to prevent bloodshed and keep people safe.

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

Would it be possible before the Minister sits down to ask two questions? My question about the value of a weapon was about whether manufacturers, retailers and wholesalers will be paid the wholesale trade value or the retail value of the weapon, if that is known. More importantly, they will have lists of people who had weapons sold to them, so will they be asked, encouraged or told that they must share their customer list with the police, who in my view should be expected to follow up on that?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

On the first part of the question, I do not know the answer. I will have to come back to the noble Lord. I think I tried to answer that when I was talking about the guidance. Obviously, the guidance has yet to be published. The noble Lord is 100% right, of course, that they should have those lists and they should consult them, but, as he knows, operational policing remains independent. The guidance will be published in June, and I think the noble Lord makes a very good point.

Motion agreed.