Knife Crime

Debate between Mohammad Yasin and Sarah Jones

Tuesday 14th April 2026 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

I welcome the hon. Lady’s welcoming of the statement—it is appreciated.

Stop and search is a really important tool. I am not entirely sure what “saturation stop and search” is, but if we stopped and searched everybody, all our police would spend all their time stopping and searching people to no particular end. Stop and search has to be evidence-based and targeted, and that is what the police are doing. We support that. We want more intelligence-led stop and search. It is a good thing, but anyone who thinks that it is the only answer misunderstands the problem. We have to prevent crime from happening in the first place, as well as to tackle the perpetrators who are already involved and make sure we address reoffending. Doing one intervention without all the rest is not going to work, which is why our action plan involves multiple Government Departments, lots of funding, and lots of support from the Prime Minister down.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

Bedfordshire police welcomes the Government’s plan to refer all child knife possession cases to youth justice services, building on its work with the NHS, schools, charities and community groups to discourage under-16s from carrying knives. Can the Minister outline how the new national co-ordination unit will crack down on illegal online knife sales in order to strengthen such local partnerships, which are working to prevent young people from having knives in the first place?

[Sarah Jones]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and pay tribute to the police in Bedfordshire, who I know are doing a really good job.

Among all the agencies he talked about, the NHS has a really important role to play. Of course, we put youth workers into most of our A&Es, so that if a young person who has been stabbed comes in, we have some chance of intervening with them to get them out of the cycle of violence they are involved in. The brilliant investigative police officers at the new National Knife Crime Centre will be investigating the sale of knives online. That will be a focused piece of policing work, and the Government are providing £1.7 million for it. Those officers will look at the sale of knives online and go after the people who are selling them illegally. Increasingly, we are seeing young people in the grey market buying knives in bulk and selling them to each other. We are going to make that very difficult for people to do, but where it does happen—where knives are coming in from countries that they should not be coming from, where age verification checks are not being done, and where companies are making money in a way that is not legal—we will come down on them like a ton of bricks.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mohammad Yasin and Sarah Jones

Monday 17th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

The hon. Gentleman will know that we are committed to the implementation of the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Act 2023 and fully support its intentions. Indeed, it was brought forward by a Member of his own party—the hon. Member for Mid Buckinghamshire (Greg Smith). We support the Act and are working with colleagues across the policing landscape to ensure that we can do just that. But I will not take any lessons from the shadow Minister who left crime in the state that it was, had no rural crime strategy, unlike this Government, and whose record took our police away from our neighbourhoods—we will put them back.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

5. What steps her Department is taking to introduce more neighbourhood police officers.

[Alice Macdonald (Norwich North) (Lab/Co-op)]

20. What steps her Department is taking to introduce more neighbourhood police officers.

[The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)]

As part of the neighbourhood policing guarantee, we have made £200 million available to police forces this financial year to kick-start the journey towards delivering 13,000 additional neighbourhood policing personnel. By April 2026, there will be 3,000 more neighbourhood police across England and Wales, strengthening police visibility and neighbourhood policing to help to deter, prevent and respond to crime.

[Mohammad Yasin]

I welcome the Government’s decision to phase out police and crime commissioners, with the savings reinvested into frontline policing. I also warmly welcome the recent grant for additional wardens to tackle antisocial behaviour hotspots. The partnership between the council, community groups and the police has reduced antisocial behaviour in Bedford town centre by nearly 15%, but much more still needs to be done. What further reforms will the forthcoming White Paper include to help Bedfordshire police get more bobbies on the beat?

[Sarah Jones]

I am pleased to see the progress made, and I would love to visit again, as I did with the Prime Minister in opposition, to see that progress in action. There are two aspects to where we are, and we will be making significant changes. One is through the Crime and Policing Bill, which contains new powers for us to tackle antisocial behaviour in our town centres—respect orders being just one example. Our wider police reform will also look at the entire policing landscape in a way that the Opposition completely failed to do in government. We will make it more efficient and effective and ensure that our police are targeted where the public want them in our communities.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mohammad Yasin and Sarah Jones

Thursday 30th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mohammad Yasin]

I am honoured to have been appointed as the UK trade envoy to Pakistan. Given the growing financial pressure on UK universities, with several leading institutions announcing job cuts amid the deepening funding crisis, what steps is the Department taking to foster stronger educational partnerships with Pakistan to help alleviate financial pressures in the sector in the UK, while supporting Pakistan’s educational goals?

[Sarah Jones]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his appointment as the trade envoy to Pakistan. I can think of no one better, and I know he will make a big difference in that role. The Government took the decision to reappoint Professor Sir Steve Smith as our international education champion to ensure that the UK-Pakistan education partnership’s work continues as part of the international education strategy, which is now jointly led by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, the Department for Education and the Department for Business and Trade. Led by Sir Steve, the UK has worked closely with the Pakistan Higher Education Commission on revising Pakistan’s new transnational education policy. That work will continue, and I am sure my hon. Friend will bring great help to it.