Offensive Weapons

Helen Hayes Excerpts

1st reading
Tuesday 23rd January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about the weapons to which section 141 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 applies; and for connected purposes.

John Ogunjobi, Glendon Spence, Jude Gayle, Donnell Rhule, Dennis Anderson, Beatrice Cenusa and Ronaldo Scott—those are the names of those who have lost their lives to knife crime in my constituency since I was elected in 2015, along with two other victims I am unable to name because their cases are before the courts. Each one was loved by their family and friends. Each one had hopes and dreams for the future. Each one left a family and a community utterly devastated by their loss. And for each of these lives that have been lost, there are many more people who have been injured with a knife, some suffering life-changing injuries, all suffering significant psychological trauma. This issue is not unique to my constituency or to London, as this is happening across the whole country—in Yorkshire, Staffordshire, Kent and many other places, young lives are being lost, with families and communities devastated.

I am grateful to all the colleagues who have expressed their support for this Bill; they come from many areas of the country and from different parties. There were many more than there is space for signatories to the Bill.

Knife crime has a devastating impact on local communities, as well as families. It takes away any sense of safety and security, makes young people afraid and traumatised and acts as a barrier to self-belief, aspiration and engagement in education and learning. In August last year, I attended an end-of-summer celebration at a local youth centre. I watched young people perform songs, raps and poems they had written and produced themselves. There was nothing but love and support in the room as we celebrated everything they had achieved together. A few days later, I met some of those same young people again nearby at a police line, watching as the body of a young man they knew was being removed from underneath a forensics tent, after he had been fatally stabbed. We all felt utterly bleak; it seemed that all of the good work of the whole summer had been completely undone in that moment.

I pay tribute to the many people in my constituency who work so hard to reduce serious violence, including the youth leaders who are so committed to supporting young people, keeping them from harm and helping them to follow their aspirations. I want to mention in particular Ecosystem Coldharbour in the Brixton part of my constituency, which is funded by the Mayor of London’s violence reduction unit; Code 7; the Rathbone Society; and KETRA—the Kingswood Estate tenants and residents association. I pay tribute also to Circle of Life Ignite, a group of mothers who have each lost a child to knife crime who are working to install bleed-stop kits in public places, so that the equipment needed to stem the bleeding from a knife wound can be accessed by members of the public and a serious incident can be prevented from becoming a tragedy.

There is some excellent work happening in our communities to tackle serious violence, but it is being frustrated and undermined by the increasingly horrific nature of the weapons that perpetrators of knife crime are able to access—so-called zombie knives or Rambo knives, machetes and ninja swords. I spoke last week with Malcolm Tunnicliff, the clinical director of major trauma at King’s College Hospital in my constituency, to ask him about the injuries his team sees from these weapons. He told me:

“we call it knife crime, but the victims we see have essentially been attacked with weapons of war.”

He told me that the injuries are devastating; with a normal knife, a victim might end up with a 2 to 3 inch scar, but zombie knives and machetes are very heavy weapons, and they inflict deeper slashes, which are incredibly disfiguring. Because they are so heavy, they are capable of cutting through tendons and bones, including the skull, so victims who survive frequently have brain injuries. The edges of these knives are often serrated, so they inflict terrible damage on vital organs. A bleed-stop kit is unfortunately woefully inadequate against such horrific weapons. Often the victims simply do not stand a chance, such is the severity of their injuries. In the case of the two most recent murders in my constituency, both victims died quickly at the scene.

Zombie and Rambo knives, machetes and ninja swords are readily available online. A quick Google search reveals many different weapons that can be purchased on Amazon, Temu and other online marketplaces for under £30. In a recent survey, Which? found that it was able to purchase items on Temu that were age-restricted or illegal under current UK law without any age verification. Google has been found to be profiting from the advertising of lethal weapons, including 17-inch zombie knives, “military tactical” blades and “zombie killer sword apocalypse machetes”, despite claiming to ban them. When such weapons are sold illegally, the enforcement is almost non-existent.

Knife crime is rising in England and Wales, having gone up by 4.7% in 2022-23 on the 2021-22 figure. There is much that can be done in communities to prevent serious violence: high-quality youth work, effective policing focused on building the trust of local communities, good mental health support, and high-quality employment and training opportunities all have a role to play. However, even where this good work is taking place, it is being undermined by the availability of lethal weapons. There is straightforward action that we in this place can take to help keep our young people safe. We can introduce an effective ban, backed up by robust enforcement, of the weapons that are being used to inflict the greatest harm.

Since 2016, the Government have promised repeatedly to introduce such a ban, but they have failed to act. In response to my recent written questions on the topic, the Minister for Crime, Policing and Fire responded that the Government would legislate “when parliamentary time allows”, yet the House of Commons Library has calculated that there were 21 days last year when the House rose early due to insufficient business, seven of which fell after the Government made its most recent promise to implement a ban. There has been parliamentary time, but the Government have simply not prioritised the issue enough to be bothered to act.

The communities I represent, and communities across the country, cannot wait any longer. Young people are dying on our streets because, in the words of the clinical director of emergency medicine at my local hospital, “weapons of war” are readily available to buy on the internet and have delivered to the doorstep. The ban the Government propose is insufficient. It is too narrow and it would leave the perpetrators of violence able to shift to a different weapon of choice, such as a sword.

My ban would extend to all zombie and Rambo knives, machetes and ninja swords, and it would cover the sale, marketing and possession of those weapons. There are very few legitimate reasons to have a hunting knife or a sword in London, or indeed in any area of the country. A licensing scheme with rigorous age verification could be introduced for any such legitimate purposes.

The issue is urgent. No family should have to endure the pain of losing a young person with their whole life ahead of them. I do not want to have to stand at a police line again, trying to find the words to say to parents who have had their whole world ripped out from underneath them, watching as a community is retraumatised once again. The issue is urgent—it is literally a matter of life or death—but it has not been treated as such by this Government.

I urge the Government to support my Bill, so that effective legislation can be introduced to remove these lethal weapons from our streets. If this Government will not act, the House can be assured that a Labour Government will.

Question put and agreed to.

Ordered,

That Helen Hayes, Wendy Morton, Florence Eshalomi, Marsha De Cordova, Bell Ribeiro-Addy, Alex Norris¸ Dawn Butler, Abena Oppong-Asare, Catherine West, Mr Virendra Sharma, Fleur Anderson and Seema Malhotra present the Bill.

Helen Hayes accordingly presented the Bill.

Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 23 February, and to be printed (Bill 148).