Gangs and Serious Youth Violence

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Thursday 3rd March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Umunna]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for referring to Harriet Sergeant’s work. Hopefully, those using the hashtag for this debate can post a link on Twitter so that those watching can read more of her work.

Part of the reason why I am not sure how helpful it is to use the word “gang” any more is that things have changed a lot just in the borough I represent in London. Around the time I was first elected, in 2010, we had mass groups of young people who had labels for their groupings. Now the situation is more parochial: things are often confined more to a particular estate, and we have much smaller groups of young people. The situation is also far more fluid.

Whitney Iles, the chief executive officer of Project 507 —she, too, is watching the debate in the House—works to prevent young people from engaging in this kind of violence. She put things really well when she told me that we give young people this gang label, but we never give them a way to get rid of it. So let us consign it to the bin, and let us not refer to it again in the House after this debate, if we can possibly avoid doing so.

The reasons for serious youth violence are not new, and we know what so many of them are. Yes, some violence is carried out by young people from dysfunctional, often chaotic families with a history of, say, domestic violence in the background. However, very often, a lot of young people who get wrapped up in these things come from quite stable families. Sometimes there is an issue because two parents are struggling to make ends meet and holding down two jobs to pay the bills. There is a link there because, as I heard from some young people this morning, someone will often have a desire to help provide for their family—for their mum—and they get wrapped up in these activities as a way of making money to help mum pay the bills.

I really do not care if the usual suspects in the media start saying, “Oh, you’re excusing all this.” We are not providing excuses today, but unless we look at why these things happen, we will not be able to prevent them. I can see the headlines: “MP says children are trying to pay the bills so they go and knife people”. That is not what I am saying; what I am saying is that we must understand the underlying causes if we want to prevent this violence from happening again.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for making a very good speech. Is not fear the real reason why people join these groups? A young person who lives on an estate in an area where these groups operate and who is not a member of any group will be fearful that a group will set upon them and do them great damage. In my limited understanding of this problem, it seems that fear is the spur for young people joining such groups.

[Mr Umunna]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very important intervention. I agree with him: fear is definitely a major factor, and I will come to it shortly. Trauma also plays a role, and I will come to that too.

There is another common theme, which I have talked about with my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham and my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North. Time and again, at every community meeting on this issue, we hear that there are simply not enough things for our young people to do. I get fed up with hearing that every week and every time we discuss this issue in the House, because nothing ever seems to get done about it. We have to ensure that there are more meaningful things for our young people to do outside school hours, and I am not talking about some windy church hall with a table tennis table. We need decent, proper activities that will expand our young people’s horizons and give them things they will enjoy doing in their local areas. Otherwise, we have the problem of collectives of their peers becoming their surrogate family. That relates to the issue that the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) talked about, but I will come on to that in a moment because I want to go through some of the other factors.

In relation to popular culture, it is too easy to blame rap music or whatever, but it is a society thing. We live in a society that promotes and glamorises violence. It is too easy to say that it is the fault of the creative industries. We increasingly have a society where our young people are encouraged to engage in these kinds of violent activities. This is promoted among us and we have to deal with it.

We live in a society that not only promotes violence and too often glamorises it, but promotes an ideal whereby our young people define themselves by reference to what they have as opposed to who they are. There is a consumerism element. Helping one’s family to get on is definitely an issue.

--- Later in debate ---

[Will Quince (Colchester) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Streatham (Mr Umunna) on securing a debate on this most important of issues. He gave a powerful and articulate speech. Last year, 188 people were killed with a knife and 119 sexual assaults took place at the point of a knife. Attempted murder and threats to kill involving a knife totalled over 2,100 incidents. It is no exaggeration to say that thousands of Britons, many of them young, have feared for their lives through stabbing.

When I was elected in May last year, I pledged to my constituents that I would do all I could to tackle to scourge of knife crime. Why? Colchester has seen too many young lives destroyed by crimes involving weapons. Jay Whiston, James Attfield and Nahid Almanea all lost their lives too early, and each case was a personal tragedy. Too many people, particularly our young people, still feel that it is acceptable to carry blades and knives. They wrongly believe that doing so will keep them safe. Let us be clear. Carrying a knife does not keep them safe; it is illegal and puts them and others in grave danger.

[Bob Stewart]

I believe that some people carry such weapons because they feel that doing so gives them status.

[Will Quince]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point, and he is absolutely right. There are many reasons why young people carry blades. Sometimes it is to do with fear—that relates to his earlier point—and sometimes they are a status symbol. We have to hammer home the message that not only is it illegal to carry a knife, but a person is statistically far more likely to be the victim of a knife crime if they do so. We have to get that message out loud and clear.

I believe that the answer to youth violence is threefold, involving deterrence, education and intervention. In the interests of time, I will focus on the first two. I welcome the steps that the Government have taken, such as minimum custodial sentences for repeat knife possession and the commitment on police budgets. I agree with the hon. Member for Streatham on the need for education, which has a key role to play. We need to do far more to educate our young people about the dangers of carrying knives.

I have campaigned for some time with a local knife crime charity, Only Cowards Carry, which provides weapons awareness lessons in schools. The charity, which is based in north Essex in the Clacton area, was set up in 2012 by Caroline Shearer, whose 17-year-old son, Jay Whiston, was fatally stabbed that year. Since then Caroline, who is an inspirational woman, has campaigned to show the devastating impact of knife crime on young lives and families, and she has provided weapons awareness lessons in schools. Those hard-hitting lessons show young people the dangers of carrying knives and blades. I have been to one and, trust me, they leave an impact. Students who are usually cocky and confident finish the lesson shocked and startled at the brutal impact that knives can have on lives. The images of knife attacks and knife wounds on young people hit home very hard. We need to send out the message that all it takes is one moment of stupidity for lives and reputations to be shattered.

We teach our young people about internet safety, road safety and citizenship. There is a strong case for more schools to teach pupils about the danger of carrying knives. As I have found, Ministers regularly throw back the challenge that the demands on the curriculum are great. I accept that point, but, to be clear, I am talking about one 45-minute lesson in year 9 or year 10. That would not be a huge burden on the national curriculum.

Last summer, Caroline Shearer and I presented a petition with 50,000 signatures to Downing Street to call for charities such as Only Cowards Carry to go into schools to give those hard-hitting lessons to our young people. That would be a big step forward in tackling knife crime, not only in Colchester and north Essex, but across the country. The Government should take another hard look at encouraging more schools to introduce weapons education lessons.

According to the crime survey for England and Wales, violent crime is down since 2010, but according to violence against the person statistics recorded by the police, violent crime has increased. The picture is far from clear, and the reasons for spikes and falls in violent crime are not well understood. It is essential that the police, supported by good academic analysis, do the research to enable them to understand what is happening in our towns and cities.

There has been too much speculation about the causes, and we really need to focus on the facts. In Essex, more than half of the notable increase in recorded victim-based crime in the last 12 months—4,463 of 8,165 crimes—was in the “violence without injury” subcategory of violence against the person. That has traditionally covered harassment, shouting and very minor stone throwing, but the Home Office has decided that it should also include online bullying and harassment. That is nonsense, and it will really distort the debate.

I believe that there is a strong argument for a new stand-alone crime type category for recording online crimes. If those crimes continue to be placed in the category of violent crime, it will be difficult to debate violent crime and its specific causes. Of course, online bullying and harassment are extremely serious crimes, which sadly affect young people more than people in any other age groups. However, the steps we need to take to tackle physical violence and gang violence are different from those needed to tackle online abuse and harassment, so it is important to look at recategorisation.

In my constituency, victim-based crime is up by 821 offences on the year. Within that, violence is up by 681 offences. As I have just mentioned, a staggering 93% of those crimes are violence with no injury, and much of the total is made up of online bullying or harassment. That puts the rise in a very different light.

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[Vicky Foxcroft]

I agree with everything my right hon. Friend says. As he said in his speech, the document is so brief that it barely defines anything or suggests what any of the solutions should be. We need to transform the debate fundamentally.

[Bob Stewart]

Further to the point made my friend, the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy), as I understand it these groups often call themselves gangs. That is part of the problem. It is therefore quite difficult to define.

[Vicky Foxcroft]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point, but we tag people in certain ways too. We define groups of people as gangs, when they could just be groups of young people hanging about together. That is why we need to transform how we talk about the subject.

--- Later in debate ---

[Angela Crawley]

I thank my hon. Friend for her point. I was intending to come on to Glasgow East later, but the project that took place there in 2008 was a response to the worst instance of gang violence that had ever occurred, which made Scotland, and particularly Glasgow, one of the worst places in western Europe for violence. The more than 600 gang members involved were presented with a choice—to use their experience to educate and train others, or face a zero-tolerance approach and possibly a prison sentence. Through this work and the ongoing commitment and support they received, remarkable results were witnessed. Violence was halved; weapon possession was down by 85%; and this group went on to establish a charity to create employment for other young people. So there are examples of where positive work can be done to reframe and re-approach the problem not just through legislation, but by working with young people to provide the support they require.

[Bob Stewart]

What was actually done to reduce the violence there? What happened on the streets to reduce it?

[Angela Crawley]

There are a number of projects, but this particular one focused on bringing the young people in, engaging them and providing them with opportunities to go on to further education or training. They continued to be supported throughout that process so that they could reach sustainable employment and other routes outwith the confines of the environment in which they had grown up and themselves experienced violence or been party to it.

This Government must recognise that where legislation is proving ineffective, they must consider changing course. Lessons must be learned from where we have been successful. I share the sentiments of the hon. Member for Streatham that young people have been given a bad name in this discussion and that more often than not we tarnish them with this reputation that makes them the perpetrators, without seeking to address the root causes of the problem, which many Members of all parties have addressed in their speeches.

I have listened to Members who have spoken of their constituents’ experience of violence and its impact on their lives, and of heart-breaking accounts from loved ones of lost years and lost lives. The hon. Member for Streatham spoke about the level of violence in London, but as has been repeated in the debate, the problem is not unique to one particular area or one particular city, so we must do more to address the problem as a matter of policy. Factors such as poverty, violence and drugs, and the rising incidence of violence against women in ghettos must be looked at in a far more holistic way to address some of those root problems.

Let me acknowledge that it was only 10 years ago, as I mentioned earlier, that Glasgow was named the murder capital of western Europe—something that the then Scottish Executive could not ignore. Despite the number of convictions, there remained a need to tackle the root of these serious problems. Scotland has been successful in reducing the number of incidents. The campaign “No Knives Better Lives” raises awareness and seeks to educate young people about the consequences of knife crime. This is one example of a measure that has contributed to success in reducing violence.

In my constituency in south Lanarkshire, a local community group established a drama workshop known as “The Street”, which has a real-life setting. It is produced by young people, many of whom have been involved in violence themselves, and it tackles issues of violence, knife crime and drug and alcohol abuse, as well as sexual violence. This message can be delivered by young people to young people in a hard-hitting way with a powerful impact, addressing the serious ramifications and consequences of actions occurring on a daily basis on the streets.

Under the stewardship of the former Scottish Justice Secretary, Kenny MacAskill, we focused on early intervention, improving life chances and the integration of the police within the community, working with young people. This resulted in a significant reduction of crime and violence. Let me declare that the incidence of violence continues on a daily basis, but we must continue to tackle these issues, which I hope the Government will take into consideration.