Sarah Jones
Main Page: Sarah Jones (Labour - Croydon West)Department Debates - View all Sarah Jones's debates with the Home Office
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The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)
Before I come to the statement, I want to echo the Home Secretary’s words yesterday following the publication of the Southport attack inquiry report. That was a truly sickening crime, and my thoughts, and those of everybody in this place, are with the families, victims and everyone who was affected.
With permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will make a statement on the Government’s plan to halve knife crime in a decade. That commitment, made in our manifesto, is rooted in recognition of a tragic truth: in too many places, a deadly cycle has taken hold, as fear and violence feed off each other, leaving people—and especially young people—feeling that they have no choice but to carry a weapon to stay safe. In the most devastating cases, that results in the loss of lives that have barely begun.
All that is wretchedly familiar to the House and to me. We know it from the long list of tragedies about which we have spoken with families across the country. We hear it in the anguished words of bereaved parents, whom many of us have met after fatal stabbings in our constituencies. We see it when we look at our children, whose safety is too often the cause of worry and sleepless nights. In these and so many other ways, knife crime is destructive and devastating, and has for too long been plaguing communities and destroying lives.
The task of putting that right falls to this Government. Since the general election we have acted decisively to deliver a response that matches up to the scale of the threat, implementing bans on zombie-style knives, zombie-style machetes and ninja swords; restoring neighbourhood policing to the heart of our communities; getting more than 63,000 knives and dangerous weapons off our streets; ramping up action against county lines gangs to record levels, with over 2,700 lines shut down last year; setting up the coalition to tackle knife crime; and legislating to deliver the toughest crackdown yet on online knife sales. The concerted effort that we have mounted, alongside our partners in the coalition, law enforcement and communities across the country, is having an impact. Since the start of this Parliament, knife crime is down by 8% and knife homicides are down by 27%, to the lowest level in a decade.
Together, we are making progress, but it is not enough. Knives are still being carried, stabbings are still occurring and lives are still being lost. Indeed, there have been several fatal cases in recent days and weeks, and I take this opportunity to express my deepest sympathies to the victims’ loved ones. For them, for all the families out there whose world has been forever changed by knife crime, and for the country as a whole, we must do more, and we are doing more.
We have published the “Protecting lives, building hope” plan, which details the action that the Government are taking and will take to further reduce knife crime and, ultimately, achieve our goal of halving it in a decade. The plan outlines activity and investment designed to drive progress across four key outcomes: supporting young people, stopping those at risk from turning to knife crime, policing our streets and ending the cycle of knife crime. I will address each in turn.
First, we will do much more to give every boy and girl the best possible start in life by addressing the root causes of knife crime; increasing investment in youth services; launching 50 Young Futures hubs to bring together wellbeing support, careers guidance and positive activities in areas badly affected by knife crime; stepping up support for children who are persistently absent from school; and investing in mental health support teams in schools. We do all that and more because we recognise that, to deliver the change that is needed, we must act early and prevent harm before it escalates into violence in later life.
Secondly, we are ramping up efforts to stop young people being drawn into knife crime, be they at risk of being an offender, a victim or both. A new Safety In & Around Schools Partnership, backed by Government funding, will see around 250 schools given targeted support to boost their capacity to tackle knife crime and reduce the risk of harm. We are also investing in the county lines programme and the highly effective network of violence reduction units, and strengthening crime prevention in the communities that need it most.
Thirdly, we will ensure that victims of knife crime get the justice that they deserve, and that dangerous criminals face the full force of the law, through a robust and effective police response. Visible local policing is central to our approach not just on knife crime but across the full breadth of this Government’s agenda on law and order. The severity of the situation that we inherited has been well documented, so I will not retrace that ground, except to say that we have made it a first-order priority to rebuild neighbourhood policing, by putting an additional 13,000 police personnel into neighbourhood roles in England and Wales by the end of this Parliament, with over 3,000 in place two months ahead of schedule, and by implementing the neighbourhood policing guarantee, under which every community has named, contactable officers devoted to tackling local issues.
Police boots on the ground are essential, but we must also ensure that forces are equipped and empowered to make interventions that are precise, timely and effective. We will therefore support the development of tools and approaches that have the potential to enhance prevention and detection, with substantial funding to enhance crime mapping, invest in research and development aimed at improving our capability to detect high-risk knife carriers, and enable targeted action in the police force areas that see the most knife crime through a new knife crime concentrations fund. We will also support forces in maximising the use of intelligence-led stop and search, and where the law needs strengthening, we will not hesitate, as shown by our commitment to introducing much tougher rules around the online sale of knives, through measures we know as Ronan’s law, after Ronan Kanda, who was fatally stabbed aged 16 and whose mother and sister have campaigned heroically for change since his death. That will all be underpinned by the most radical programme of police reform in 200 years.
Fourthly, we will seek to end the cycle of repeat harm by strengthening the youth justice system, improving the rehabilitation of adult offenders to reduce the risk of reoffending and developing a new national approach to identify, prioritise and manage habitual knife offenders who pose the greatest risk to public safety.
Each of those four strands is important on its own, and the steps that we are taking within them have been chosen because the evidence supports that. Equally, I am clear that this work transcends individual policies or initiatives. Ours is a whole-of-Government, whole-of-society mission aimed at building a safer, more hopeful future for all. The publication of this plan marks a significant moment in that mission, not because of what it says, but because of the action that it will drive.
Above all, we think today of the victims, and of the families that are smaller than they should be. Although we can never undo the pain inflicted on them, we can prevent others from suffering as they have. It will not be easy, but this Government will be unrelenting in the vital effort to protect lives and build hope. As Pooja Kanda so aptly put it,
“Every child deserves to grow up safely.”
She is right, and we must and will do everything in our power to make those words a reality in every part of our country. I commend this statement to the House.
Matt Vickers (Stockton West) (Con)
I thank the Minister for advance sight of her statement. Halving knife crime is a measure that every Member of this House would subscribe to. It is a devastating crime with devastating consequences. Only yesterday, this House discussed the tragic events in Southport and the impact they can have on a community. Those events are, unfortunately, representative of a much broader problem, whereby too many people view it as appropriate to carry and use a knife criminally. That is horrific and must be stopped. We owe it to the country, and particularly those in communities affected by knife crime, to take knives off our streets and prosecute those who believe that using weapons is acceptable.
Unfortunately, since the election, knife-enabled crime recorded by the police has increased. In addition, we must acknowledge that, based on the data up to September 2025, 30% of all knife offences took place in London, despite London making up only 15% of the population. We need proposals that recognise the geographical nature of this crime, with so much of it occurring in particular areas. As such, it is welcome to see that the Government’s plan includes the knife crime concentrations fund, to support surges in policing where knife crime is most prevalent. However, I am afraid that the Labour Government’s proposals will not be sufficient without two critical foundations: powers for officers to stop and search individuals, and sufficient officer numbers to put this strategy into effect.
The hotspot policing outlined by the Government must be used in conjunction with effective stop and search, which the Government’s strategy acknowledges is broadly supported by the public. That is why we have set out plans to triple the use of stop and search and to use section 60 suspicionless stop and search in high-crime areas. That should be supported by changes so that a single suspicion indicator is enough to merit a stop and search.
That would be supported by 10,000 new officers. In contrast, the Government have presided over a decrease in officer numbers, with 1,300 fewer officers during their time in power, with particularly steep falls in the Metropolitan police, who cover the area where this crime is most prevalent. In the Government’s plan, they talk about the need for officers, but that is not reflected in the overall figures, as police forces across the country highlighted during discussions on police funding. If we want to see the police help achieve these reductions and the Government meet their targets, there cannot be fewer officers.
In addition, under the Sentencing Act 2026, many of those convicted of knife crime will be eligible for release earlier than under previous rules. The strategy covers many important areas, but there are few references to sentencing perpetrators of knife crime for longer. It is pitiful that those convicted of knife crime offences who would previously have gone to prison could now avoid it. That is unsurprising, as it took extensive effort from Opposition Members and those in the other place to increase knife crime sentences in the Crime and Policing Bill. The Labour party repeatedly speaks strongly, but it fails to back this up with the necessary custodial sentences.
The Government’s statement today and their strategy set out a number of important proposals and rightly recognise the importance of education and culture, building on work conducted by the previous Government on violence reduction units and the county lines programme. However, that must be supported by stronger enforcement, ensuring that those who commit these crimes are imprisoned with appropriate custodial sentences. Knife crime is truly horrific, and we owe it to everyone to give the police every power necessary to investigate and seize these weapons. I worry that without stronger enforcement, this plan will not be the significant moment the Government believe it will be.
Sarah Jones
I thank the shadow Minister for welcoming the target of halving knife crime, the content of the plan and the knife crime concentrations fund in particular. Where we can, we should try to work cross-party on tackling such heinous crimes.
The shadow Minister mentioned sentencing. It will always be the case that people found guilty of serious knife crime offences will go to prison—that is not changing. We are making a couple of changes that he would hopefully support. To give one example, currently around 1,000 children a year are found in possession of a knife, and no action whatsoever is taken to try to get them away from that activity—none whatsoever. We have changed the rules on that, so that every single child who is found in possession of a knife will be given a plan, which will ensure that they get the support and the interventions they need to move away from crime. If they do not adhere to those conditions, it will become a criminal matter if necessary. That is a big gap we are filling.
In the Crime and Policing Bill, which the House will debate this afternoon, we are introducing a new offence of knife possession with intent—currently, there are offences of possession of a knife, and possession involving a threat to life—and there will be a seven-year maximum sentence for that crime. I hope that that reassures the shadow Minister.
We could get into a debate about numbers, but I do not want to do that today, because we have done it many times before, and I am sure we will do it many more times. However, I reiterate that there are 12,000 officers in our country who are sitting behind desks. We do not think that is right. We want to get them out into our communities. There has been an 18% increase in the number of police in our neighbourhoods in the last year. We want those officers to do the job that we want them to do, not waste time on bureaucracy, so we are investing hugely in artificial intelligence and new technology. That will free up the equivalent of 3,000 full-time officers—just by giving them the tech that they should already have had to help them do their job. We are pushing as hard as we can, not on the exact number of officers, but on outcomes.
I end by repeating a statistic that I am very pleased about, and that shows that we are moving in the right direction: knife crime is down 8% overall, and knife murders are down 27%. We are focusing on outcomes, not police numbers.
Sam Carling (North West Cambridgeshire) (Lab)
On Sunday, there was a horrific attack in my constituency; a 16-year-old boy was fatally stabbed in Orton. My thoughts—and those of the House, I am sure—are with his family.
I welcome the Government’s ambition to halve knife crime. How will that help to tackle the issue in Peterborough and across Cambridgeshire? What work is under way on understanding the root causes of why, in certain regions, knife crime is not following the national trend and decreasing, so that we can better address those root causes?
Sarah Jones
I thank my hon. Friend for his question; of course, all our thoughts are with the family of his constituent who has lost his life. These things are always tragic, and I know that he will be involved in trying to help the community heal from such a difficult situation. I know that arrests have been made on suspicion of murder and other offences; I think four people have been arrested. That is good, but of course, nothing will bring back that young lad.
We have to understand where knife crime is happening and why, and we are investing a huge amount of funding in exactly that. Through our work, we are able to identify exactly where the knife-crime hotspots are across the country, and we are working with local partners and the police to ensure that we understand exactly why there are these hotspots. In some parts of the country, this is happening just after school, because, sadly, this is a crime that involves young people. Sometimes the night-time economy is driving knife crime, and sometimes it is other things. We are absolutely focused on the causes of knife crime, and on providing a lot of support to young people to try to bring them out of a life of crime, but also on understanding exactly what is going on in some areas. As my hon. Friend says, there will be some areas where knife crime is going up, and some where it is coming down. We need to understand that and address it.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.
Luke Taylor (Sutton and Cheam) (LD)
The Liberal Democrats welcome the publication of the strategy, and I am particularly glad to note the involvement of the Ben Kinsella Trust in formulating it. The trust does remarkable work with young students and teachers to make sure that we take a holistic approach to knife crime, which is badly needed. That is particularly true of its chief executive officer, Patrick Green, who I had the pleasure of meeting at Finsbury library last year. We Liberal Democrats have said time and again that we need a smarter approach to knife crime, not just to save lives but to improve them. Will the Minister commit to securing long-term funding for the measures outlined in the strategy? Without that guarantee, the strategy will be little more than warm words.
Secondly, will the Minister confirm whether the 13,000 new police officers in the neighbourhood teams that the Government claim to be deploying are actually a new resource, or is this an accounting trick, whereby existing officers are redeployed? The Minister may not want to talk about numbers, but they are particularly important in London; the Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley has said that it is increasingly difficult to keep Londoners safe with a shrinking force, and estimates suggests that there are 2,503 fewer police officers in London today than there were in May 2024. I am happy to be corrected on that number.
Finally, will the Minister explain why the Government continue to skirt around the edges of a meaningful public health approach, without adopting one outright? We know that knife crime is not just a policing issue; it is a public health crisis. If we are serious about tackling it as the epidemic that it is, we must treat it as one, and bring together every person who sees the warning signs: teachers, GPs, youth workers, social workers, sports coaches—trusted adults who know when something is going wrong—and, tragically, as we have read in the conclusions of the Southport inquiry report, parents too. Right now, all those groups are isolated and do not talk to each other. We need to break down the silo walls and build real partnerships across civil society. Until the Government recognise that and invest in a public health approach, our progress will be blunted.
Sarah Jones
I appreciate the Liberal Democrats welcoming the plan. I join the hon. Gentleman in praising the Ben Kinsella Trust and Patrick Green. Patrick has been brilliant throughout the development of the strategy, as have the members of the coalition that brought together a group of people, many of whom have lost loved ones in very difficult circumstances, to push for action to stop other people losing their loved ones. I pay tribute to all of them.
The funding for the plan will come from across Government, not just the Home Office. Home Office funding amounts to about £130 million—a substantial sum—but the Department for Culture, Media and Sport is leading on the Young Futures hubs, the Department for Education is leading on interventions in schools, and the Ministry of Justice is making a huge investment in the youth justice system, so there is a big cross-Government approach.
I have done a lot of work over the years on the public health approach. It is quite simple; it basically says that violence is catching. If people have violence in their life, they are more likely to be violent. Someone who was in a domestic abuse situation as a child is more likely to be violent; people who join a gang are more likely to become violent—it is relatively straightforward. The interventions that we are putting in place are designed to prevent those crimes and stop that violence spreading. That is why the figures on violence are coming down, and we are seeing the first shoots of success.
On the numbers, there has been a 0.6% drop overall in the number of police officers from March 2025 to September 2025—that is a very small drop. The key question is: what are our police officers doing? Having 12,000 officers behind desks is not right; they should be out in our communities. Obviously, some of them need to do jobs that do not involve being out on our streets, but we want our officers out on our streets. We have always said—we said it in our manifesto—that the 13,000 will be a mix of new officers, police community support officers and redeployed officers.
We are introducing new technology, so that we can free up the equivalent of 3,000 officers’ time. It is much better for that 13,000 to be a mix of officers; it means that we have already been able to deliver 3,000, some of whom are already trained officers, so they know what they are doing. If we were just recruiting new people, there would be the challenge of new officers not having the experience that others have. We have always said that we would be taking a mixed approach. The point is that we are putting 13,000 police officers into our communities and neighbourhoods, which is what the public want. Those officers will help to tackle the epidemic of everyday crime, and knife crime too.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
I call the Chair of the Justice Committee.
Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith and Chiswick) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for agreeing to meet me and members of the safer knives group, which brings together experts on the type of knives most commonly used in knife crime. Does she agree that restricting sales of pointed knives, and moving to rounded-tip versions for kitchen use, could limit the number and type of injuries caused, especially in domestic and impulsive violence, potentially reducing death and serious injuries?
Sarah Jones
I applaud the work that my hon. Friend has been doing with others, including Leanne Lucas, who was sadly at the horrendous event in Southport, and who has been campaigning on the issue since then. I have had the honour of meeting her several times to talk about this. My hon. Friend is right that ordinary kitchen knives are used extensively in domestic and impulsive violence. When it comes to the streets, there are a whole range of horrific knives that we are looking to reduce in number, ban and control through legislation, but the basic impulsive act of picking up a kitchen knife is also a significant crime. There is evidence that a knife attack would have less impact if the end of the knife was rounded, and we have worked with manufacturers and others who are introducing that kind of knife.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Where psychopaths are concerned, deterrence is unlikely to work, but I was interested to hear an expert from the Internet Watch Foundation, who was interviewed on Times Radio this morning, say that people who commune on the internet with those who supply them with knives could instantly bring together red flags and warn people, if they wanted to. Is it part of the Minister’s strategy to try to arrange for that? As for others, am I right in thinking that a very high proportion of people who commit knife crimes are detected? If so, surely a campaign saying, “If you commit knife crime, you will almost certainly be caught” could act as a real deterrent to those capable of being deterred.
Sarah Jones
Yes, the right hon. Gentleman is right that a very high proportion of people who commit knife offences are detected and charged. How we influence people who may want to pick up a knife is an interesting and difficult question. We are investing a small amount of money in trialling some communication techniques. A lot of money has been spent on the violence against women and girls campaign, which many people will have seen; it tries to educate men on violence and how to behave. We are going to do some testing on which messages might work, and which might not, to try to target people who might pick up a knife.
The right hon. Gentleman’s first question was about the sale of knives online, and whether retailers can detect issues that should be raised. The National Knife Crime Centre, which was launched a couple of weeks ago and has £1.7 million in Government funding, has a team of police officers who will investigate the sale of knives online. We are introducing legislation about buying knives in bulk; sadly, people buy, for example, 300 knives, and then sell them in their communities. Retailers will have an obligation to tell the police if people buy in bulk. We will be able to see the patterns and intervene at the right time.
Claire Hazelgrove (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Lab)
A family and my whole community have been left reeling, following the fatal stabbing of Jamie Collins, a 21-year-old student at the University of the West of England, last week in Filton. Jamie has been named by police today, following the arrest of another young man. I am sure that the thoughts of the whole House are with Jamie’s loved ones, as are my thoughts, at this unimaginably difficult time. I have listened to the Minister’s statement with interest. How will the new knife crime plan seek to reduce youth knife crime specifically, so that fewer families have to face the impossible, and so that we can ensure that young people have the safe and bright future that they deserve?
Sarah Jones
All our condolences go to Jamie’s family at this incredibly difficult time. I know that the community in Filton will be reeling, and that my hon. Friend will play her role in bringing people together to come to terms with what has happened. It is catastrophic when someone loses their life at such a young age.
Through the action plan, which I commend—[Interruption.] I am not supposed to hold things up, am I? My point, in holding up the document, was to show that the action plan is substantial; it has a lot in it to ensure that young people do not get involved in crime in the first place and to tackle the challenge if they do. DCMS is leading on our Young Futures hubs: 50 youth centres across areas that are impacted particularly by knife crime. The hubs will bring together lots of different services for young people in one place so that they can be supported.
We are also doing more on interventions for young people if they are found to be in possession of a knife. We are backing the violence reduction units with £66 million, and they are doing a range of evidenced interventions to try to make sure that young people step away from crime. There is a whole plan of activities to get them out of crime and to prevent crime from happening in the first place, and I hope that my hon. Friend’s community will see the effects.
Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)
I had the opportunity to go out with the local police in my constituency on an operation to combat youth crime. One thing I found most distressing was the liberal ownership and unthinking use of knives among teenagers, which I know the police in my constituency are desperate to sort out. Following the Government’s consultation on knife sales, will the Minister reassure my constituents, the police and the public that the Government will put forward a knife licensing scheme, whereby all knife retailers, including online, bricks-and-mortar and private sellers, must be registered to sell any kind of knife in order to prevent attacks from taking place?
Sarah Jones
We are already putting in place a range of interventions through the Crime and Policing Bill—which is going through Parliament and which we are debating this afternoon—to strengthen age verification for knives, and to ensure that online companies have a duty to remove violent content and knife sale content, and are doing more to do so. As the hon. Lady says, we have also consulted on whether we should have a licensing scheme. We are looking through that at the moment and deciding where we go. The campaign has been led by Pooja Kanda, the mother of Ronan Kanda, who died; she has been campaigning on this issue ever since. We are certainly very sympathetic, but we are the stage of looking at the consultation and seeing what a workable licensing scheme would look like.
Jim McMahon (Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)
If we want to end the scourge of knife crime, we have to tackle supply, demand, enforcement, education and culture. Oldham has seen some of Greater Manchester’s highest numbers of section 60 stop-and-search areas, and there is often a clear pattern of gang activity, resulting in children carrying knives and other weapons. Petty postcode wars can escalate from online bullying to on-street attacks with serious injury and loss of life. I welcome the announcement of the Young Futures hubs, but given the overwhelming evidence of youth knife crime in Oldham and the cross-border activity in neighbouring Manchester, which has been selected for one of the new hubs, can Oldham be urgently considered as the programme rolls out?
Sarah Jones
We are working with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport on where the Young Futures hubs will be, but they will be in the areas most affected by knife crime. There is a whole range of other interventions, which I hope will support my hon. Friend’s community to bring down knife crime overall. It will not just be the Young Futures hubs; many more interventions in our strategy are also designed to support. Greater Manchester has a big investment in addressing county lines, with which he will probably be very familiar. That has been incredibly successful and has got more successful every year that it has been in play. We are funding that this year. Hundreds of knives are being taken off our streets, and thousands of young children are being safeguarded as a result.
Ben Obese-Jecty (Huntingdon) (Con)
It was around this time last year that I led the Backbench Business debate in the Chamber on preventing knife crime among children and young people, so I welcome the measures announced by the Minister and hope that they have a huge impact, reducing the use of knives by young people. I want to touch on two points in her announcement.
When it comes to banning zombie knives, we know that they and ninja swords account for less than 4% of all fatal stabbings. Screwdrivers account for more fatal stabbings, and household kitchen knives account for over half of all those stabbings. Given how easily accessible they are, do the Government have any steps in place? I appreciate that stopping access to kitchen knives is an impossible task, given that everybody in this Chamber has them at home, but are the Government considering any measures to dissuade people from using kitchen knives in this way? Furthermore, we know that social media has a huge influence on children, creating the fear that leads to them carrying a knife. Does the Minister have any steps to address that?
Sarah Jones
I thank the hon. Gentleman for welcoming the strategy and for the work he has done. He is absolutely right: people commit knife crime offences with all different kinds of knives. Some of the knives that have been banned have a particularly pernicious impact, given the damage they do to people’s bodies. We are putting in place a whole raft of interventions to ensure there is more control over the sale of all types of knives. These includes the age verification checks in the Crime and Policing Bill, and interventions on the sale of knives generally: making sure that young people are not buying knives, and putting in place a duty on companies to report if people buy in bulk. My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter) also mentioned the work that campaigners are doing on the design of knives to stop them being so impactful.
The hon. Member for Huntingdon (Ben Obese-Jecty) is absolutely right about social media. In the Bill, we are putting more onus on social media companies to do more, with a duty to report the sale of knives that are illegal. There is a lot more to be done with regard to very serious violent content online. This Government—including the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones)—have done a lot of work on this issue and are doing a huge amount to address porn, child sexual exploitation and violence against women and girls, but there is another piece of work to be done with the companies to ensure that all violent content is removed.
Lewis Atkinson (Sunderland Central) (Lab)
My family sadly knows the devastating consequences of knife crime. As the Government launch their welcome action plan today, I think of my cousin David Charlton, who was killed with a knife in 2012. Reducing knife crime is a moral imperative, so that there are fewer families like David’s or indeed like the family of Connor Brown, whose bereaved parents have done excellent work in tackling knife crime in Sunderland and the north-east and were recently recognised with MBEs for that work. Their approach has focused on education, so will the Minister say a little more about the plan’s commitment to update the curriculum from September so that every child receives knife violence prevention education in school? Will she support the involvement of bereaved families where they want to be part of the delivery of that curriculum?
Sarah Jones
May I say how sorry I am to hear about the death of my hon. Friend’s relative? What a tragedy that is, not just for the immediate family, but for the wider communities in which people live.
Education is key, and I have worked very hard on this raft of measures with the Department for Education. As my hon. Friend says, there is new guidance to schools on violence prevention, which will help to educate young people. Just a couple of weeks ago, I was with a bereaved parent who is going into schools and helping to teach young people about the reality of knife crime and what happens. That is a very important part of the picture. We are targeting in particular 250 schools in areas where there are very high concentrations of knife crime; we will be giving them more support so that they can access the services they need. We are very joined up with the Department for Education on this action plan.
Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con)
Will the Minister speak to Sadiq Khan and ask him to get a grip on the knife crime epidemic that is plaguing London? Can we increase the stop-and-search powers of the Met police so that they can actually do their job and provide the enforcement that people across London are asking for? My husband was attacked by someone with a knife while he was caring for his mother-in-law, and one of our wonderful members of staff in the Tea Room was attacked in Brixton by someone with a knife just last week. This is a problem across London. My residents want to feel safe. Will the Minister do something to stop the knife crime epidemic that is plaguing London?
Sarah Jones
Can I start by saying that I am very sorry that somebody from the Tea Room was attacked last week? I had not been aware of that, and I will find out more about it. I am also very sorry to hear about the hon. Lady’s husband.
The growing narrative around London is just wrong. It has been debunked by lots of sensible people in lots of ways, so I will not go into all the details, but we know that the Mayor of London has invested more in policing than at any time before. Stop and search is an important tool, and the Mayor of London and the police in London use it; across the country, there are about 14,000 searches per year where a weapon is found, which is a high number. Stop and search is used effectively, and its use actually went down every year when Boris Johnson was Mayor of London. It is better to use effective stop and search, which is what we are doing—it is an important tool. Only last week, the Mayor of London announced that he is going to be opening a youth club in every single London borough, which will help to make sure that young people have somewhere to go and something to do. I hope the hon. Lady welcomes that.
Jessica Toale (Bournemouth West) (Lab)
I welcome the serious action that this Government are taking to tackle knife crime. My constituent Tracy set up Changes Are Made following the fatal stabbing of her grandson Cameron. Tracy’s ambition is to get a youth hub set up in our local area, and she has already spoken to almost 1,000 young people in schools across Bournemouth and Poole. Some 62% of those young people have said that better education is the best way to prevent knife crime, so can the Minister please assure me that equipping young people with the knowledge they need is part of our strategy, and that areas such as my constituency will be part of our plan for support?
Sarah Jones
I assure my hon. Friend that every part of the country, including Bournemouth, will be part of our action plan. We are making interventions across the whole country, as well as very targeted interventions where knife crime is particularly acute. I have already outlined our interventions in schools, whether that is support for the schools where the problem is most acute, or the overall interventions to make sure schools are fulfilling new guidance on violence prevention. Lots of brilliant people—my hon. Friend spoke about Tracy—are going into our schools and sending really powerful messages to our young people. I absolutely support that work, and a lot of our violence reduction units provide funding for those kinds of interventions.
Sarah Pochin (Runcorn and Helsby) (Reform)
While I of course welcome the statement and any attempt to reduce and tackle knife crime, does the Minister not agree that without saturation stop and search, and without immediate custody of anyone found in possession of a knife without a valid reason, the rest is just white noise?
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.
Adam Dance (Yeovil) (LD)
Sadly, we have had several stabbings in Yeovil, which has led to growing local anxiety. My constituents keep telling me that they want more visible local policing, but south Somerset is so often overlooked that locals have all but given up on change. They are worried that it is not going to happen, so can the Minister tell my constituents when they will see proper funding for more visible community policing and accessible youth services in rural south Somerset?
Sarah Jones
I want to reassure the hon. Member’s constituents in Yeovil that I understand their concern. Neighbourhood policing has been decimated over recent years, which has had a real impact. It is why we have seen shocking rises in things like shop theft and antisocial behaviour—the things that have not been tackled because the police were not physically present on our streets. We are putting that right. We have already put 3,000 more police on our streets in our neighbourhoods—an 18% rise from what we inherited when we entered government—and we will continue to do so. We believe that the right place for our police officers and PCSOs is out on our streets, making sure they are tackling the epidemic of everyday crime, and that is what we will be doing.
Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for her statement, and welcome the Government’s plan to halve knife crime in a decade. In my constituency we have seen far too many lives taken as a result of knife crime—indeed, just last month, another young life was lost when a 25-year-old was killed. As such, it is really important that the Government are seeking to tackle the root causes, investing in youth services as well as preventive services. Already in my constituency, though, we have some fantastic organisations doing incredible work, such as Carney’s Community. The Minister’s predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North and Cottingham (Dame Diana Johnson), agreed to visit Carney’s to see some of the work it is doing and how it is seeking to deter young people from a life of violence and crime. Will the Minister honour that commitment and join me in a visit to that organisation in my constituency?
Sarah Jones
I thank my hon. Friend for her question—how sorry I am that a 25-year-old lost their life recently. My constituency and that of my hon. Friend are not too far away from each other, and we have faced similar challenges. Of course, I am very happy to fulfil any commitment that my predecessor made, and I would very much like to see what is happening in my hon. Friend’s constituency.
Iqbal Mohamed (Dewsbury and Batley) (Ind)
I thank the Minister for her statement and welcome the Government’s plan to halve knife crime in a decade. Unfortunately, though, knife crime is not limited to London or city centres; in Dewsbury and Batley, knife crime is higher than the national average, and violent crime—which includes knife crime—makes up the largest share of reported crimes. In just the past few weeks in my constituency, we have seen a number of deeply concerning incidents, including reports of a machete being used in a street fight on 10 April, a 15-year-old boy being stabbed the same day, and a knife-related assault in the town centre earlier that week. These are not isolated incidents; they are a worrying pattern that is causing real fear. Will the Minister set out what immediate, targeted action her Department is or will be taking in areas experiencing clusters of knife crime, such as Dewsbury and Batley, and how quickly residents will be able to see a tangible, positive impact?
Sarah Jones
Our knife crime concentrations fund of £26 million will be targeted at areas where there is a high concentration of knife crime. It is quite extraordinary: from the state-of-the-art mapping on police-recorded knife crime that we have done, we can see that all of our knife crime happens in less than 2.5% of England and Wales, so targeting resources at those areas is obviously the right thing to do. That does not mean that we do not also have to worry about other areas outside that 2.5%, which is why we are investing in neighbourhood policing and supporting our children across the country through interventions in schools. It is why we are funding things like efforts to tackle county lines, which impact the whole of the country even if they start in cities. We are making sure that we are targeting all parts of the country while also using the bulk of our resources where the highest numbers of crimes happen.
Several hon. Members rose—
Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
I welcome the publication of this strategy, and I pay tribute to the Minister for her strong commitment over many years to this area of policy and the depth of her thinking on it. In my constituency, we have seen far too many horrific tragedies. Out of those tragedies, however, has come some truly exceptional work in response from the community and from our grassroots youth-led organisations, in providing services that support young people. Those services provide positive opportunities for young people, help the community to come to terms with the trauma they have experienced and set young people back on a positive track. However, those organisations tell me that they struggle to access long-term sustainable funding. What is the Minister doing as part of this strategy to ensure that our youth organisations can keep the lights on and do their important work as part of the infrastructure of services that we need to tackle this problem?
Sarah Jones
My hon. Friend and I take the same approach, and knife crime is such an important issue in our constituencies. It is front and centre of everything that we do and think about. She is right to say that from tragedies come exceptional people doing exceptional things, and those people need support. She is also right to ask the question about long-term sustainable funding. The funding on youth justice interventions is long-term, and our local authorities have now got long-term funding, too. The funding for our violence reduction units has been for just this year, but I very much hear the call that long-term funding helps those organisations to plan much better for the future.
Shockat Adam (Leicester South) (Ind)
I welcome the Minister’s statement, and I send my deepest sympathy to the families of everyone who has been affected, especially the family of Khaleed Oladipo, a 20-year-old young man who was stabbed in my constituency just a few weeks ago and sadly lost his life. I also pay tribute to grassroots organisations and individuals with street experience, such as Ditch the Knife, for the vital work that they do. I am glad that the Minister is aware of the work being done by De Montfort University on round-bladed knives, because in 2025 alone 95 lives were lost to kitchen knives. Will she commit to ensuring that grassroots organisation and those with real-life street experience are empowered to play a greater role in delivering lifesaving work?
Sarah Jones
I express my condolences over the death of the man in the hon. Member’s constituency. Grassroots organisations are incredibly important and we have done a lot of work, as have the violence reduction units, in making sure that things are evidence-based, so that we know they are having an impact and are working. The Youth Endowment Fund has done a whole raft of work looking at what does and does not work, so that we know that and fund it appropriately. I hope that he can be reassured that we will continue to support, through violence reduction units and other vehicles, those local grassroots organisations to make sure that they are having the impact we need them to have.
Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford) (Lab)
I welcome the Minister’s comments, but she will know that youth charities have described knife crime as a public health issue linked to cuts in youth services. Will she therefore outline how this strategy addresses those structural drivers in areas that will not receive one of the 50 Young Futures hubs, including access to youth provision, mental health support and family services? Will she meet me to discuss how the brilliant Salford Youth Zone can play its part in the Government’s strategy and receive the additional resources that it needs to deliver the Government’s plans?
Sarah Jones
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The decimation of our youth services that we saw over the past 15 or so years, because they are not a statutory function for local authorities, has been catastrophic. We all know the impact of that. We are rebuilding infrastructure that has been torn away, and that is a challenge. As she says, we are introducing 50 youth hubs. The Mayor of London announced a youth centre for every borough in London, and other mayors across the country are doing what they can with their funding to make sure we are putting these services back. There is a huge push in the Department for Education and the Department of Health and Social Care to make sure that we have got people supporting our kids’ mental health in schools. There is a whole raft of interventions, but I am happy to talk to her about what Salford youth club is doing.
Rachel Hopkins (Luton South and South Bedfordshire) (Lab)
In Luton South and South Bedfordshire, we know all too well the devastating impact of knife crime, so I welcome our Government’s ambitious plan to halve it over the next decade, and in particular the emphasis on supporting young people and youth services. The Luton Youth Partnership Service is doing excellent targeted early-intervention work locally. Will the Government collaborate with existing programmes that focus on multi-agency partnerships to ensure that best practice is built on and expanded?
Sarah Jones
I am interested in what the Luton Youth Partnership Service is doing, and perhaps my hon. Friend and I can have a chat about that at some point. We are not trying to reinvent the wheel, but rather support the organisations that already exist. There are some gaps that we are trying to fill. For example, we are running a whole range of pilots across the country where we are intervening with young people who have been arrested but not charged; a lot of those people slipped through the net. We are doing a lot of work in that space, but we do not want to reinvent what is already working. I am happy to talk to my hon. Friend more about her partnership.
Ms Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)
I know that the Minister, like me, has had conversations with a parent who has lost a loved one. As an MP, they break your heart. I think particularly today of the mother of Josh McKay, who was murdered in my constituency a few years ago. He was a young man with his whole life ahead of him and a young family. I also thank the Minister for her open acknowledgment of the value of voluntary and community groups such as Street Fathers, Project Zero, Spark2Life and Break Tha Cycle, which do fantastic work in my community with our young people. May I press her on something? She talks powerfully about the importance of making school a safe place, but she will know of the concerns many of us have about the unilateral decision to withdraw school safety officers in my constituency. Headteachers tried to raise that concern. What confidence can she give us that those officers will return? They were such an important part of our fabric of supporting our young people to be safe.
Sarah Jones
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the work that she does in her constituency, and I send my condolences to Josh’s family, who will still be reeling after their loss. I agree with her that organisations such as Break Tha Cycle and Street Fathers do incredibly important work that we need to support. The target from this Government is that we should have a massive increase in our neighbourhood police officers, and we expect those officers to have a role going into schools and building relationships. We know that those relationships can be powerful. With those neighbourhood officers, we are trying to have consistency and to professionalise the neighbourhood route, so that people want to stay in it, rather than moving on up through the ranks and moving away from it. We want to have some continuity. We are also working to ensure that they are not abstracted, which is the other challenge that we have, particularly in large cities. When we have our proper cohort of neighbourhood officers, those people can be involved in their local schools, as we would expect them to be.
Natasha Irons (Croydon East) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for her tireless work and campaigning on this issue, both in this place and in our community of Croydon. I know that this moral mission is personal to her, but given her experience, does she agree that tackling knife crime requires a whole-system approach bringing together policing, schools, health and communities? Can she outline how this plan strengthens the partnerships at a local level in communities like ours in Croydon?
Sarah Jones
I thank my hon. Friend for her kind words, and I know that we tackle this issue together in Croydon. The point of this package of interventions is not just to stop kids getting involved in crime, but to make sure that we have got the right justice system and the right policing system, while stopping repeat offenders. A whole raft of interventions will directly impact on Croydon, which has a really good violence reduction unit that is working hard, and we want to support all the local organisations there. Our increase in neighbourhood policing will also significantly help. In Croydon, we also have live facial recognition, too, which is an interesting and powerful intervention in tackling crime. We are consulting at the moment on its legal basis.
John Grady (Glasgow East) (Lab)
I welcome the Labour Government’s focus on knife crime. One courageous family in my constituency lost their beloved boy, Kory, who was stabbed to death by a 13-year-old boy. Kory’s family and I have asked the Scottish Government and Glasgow city council to confirm that the council has thoroughly reviewed all their dealings with the 13-year-old child convicted of killing Kory. That review is essential so that lessons are learned to prevent future tragedies. However, it is also essential to ensure that the rehabilitation of the child convicted of killing Kory is underpinned by a thorough understanding of that child’s background. The Scottish Government and Glasgow city council absolutely refuse to confirm that a thorough case review has taken place. Does the Minister agree that when children commit serious crimes, it is essential that thorough case reviews are carried out?
Sarah Jones
What a horrific thing it is that has happened in my hon. Friend’s community—the murder of a child by a 13-year-old child. Of course we need to understand what has happened. I completely agree with my hon. Friend about the need to ensure that we always learn the lessons and that proper reviews are in place, and the framework is there to do that. While responsibility sits with the Scottish Government and local partners in this case, I cannot but agree wholeheartedly with what my hon. Friend has said.
Catherine Atkinson (Derby North) (Lab)
Derby is a city that unites to tackle the toughest challenges. When more co-ordination has been needed in relation to knife crime involving young people, school leaders, the council and Derbyshire constabulary have been around the table to strengthen that joined-up response locally. Local organisations such as Safe and Sound also do crucial work with our young people. Does the Minister agree that tackling knife crime requires a partnership response that brings together communities, the police, schools and health authorities, and can she say a little about how the Government’s plan will strengthen those local partnerships?
Sarah Jones
I thank my hon. Friend for the work that she is doing in bringing together local organisations to help ensure that we are tackling these issues. A raft of interventions in the plan will help local organisations to do the work that needs to be done, and we are introducing the biggest police reform in 200 years, which involves work relating to prevention and how community safety partnerships work locally. We have committed ourselves to reviewing that whole landscape to ensure that rather than people duplicating work, sitting in different meetings and doing different things, everyone is coming together with a single plan to tackle violence.
Jen Craft (Thurrock) (Lab)
Like many other Members on both sides of the House, I am often struck by the courage and bravery of bereaved families who have lost loved ones to knife crime. Last year I spoke to a father who had lost his son, and who is dedicated to improving life and seeing positive change in other communities to ensure that no one else suffers the grief that he has suffered. How best can he and others like him play their part in delivering this action plan?
Sarah Jones
I never cease to be amazed by how incredibly resilient people are in their ability to suffer such loss and then come forward and campaign to ensure that it does not happen again. There are a number of different ways in which people can get involved—for instance, through the work of violence reduction units and local violence reduction plans. I am sure I can give my hon. Friend a list of organisations with which her constituent could potentially get involved. We need as many people as possible to help in this regard, because what is needed is a community-led and community-driven response.
Luke Myer (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)
I regularly raise the need for more resources for frontline policing in Cleveland. We have a small population but high deprivation, and the police funding formula does not take account of the severity of crime in our region—including knife crime, the prevalence of which is among the highest in the country. I welcome the 48 new police personnel who have begun neighbourhood roles over the last year, but what more can we do to get more resources to the frontline and make our streets safe again?
Sarah Jones
Cleveland police is one of the forces that we talk to regularly, because, as my hon. Friend says, the current police funding formula is not fit for purpose. It is very old, and it needs reform. We are reforming the whole structure of policing, and as part of that we will review the formula to bring it up to date and make it fit for purpose. Although I have no answer for my hon. Friend now, the question of the formula bears heavily on my mind, and we are doing a great deal of work on it in the Department.
Mr Jonathan Brash (Hartlepool) (Lab)
I welcome the 8% reduction in knife crime and the increase in neighbourhood policing, which has seen a named officer in every ward of Hartlepool, but the Minister is right to say—and my constituents would agree—that it is not enough. Frontline officers tell me that they are taken off the street for far too long because they have to travel to Middlesbrough owing to the closure of our custody suite by the Conservative party. Given that the funding formula is broken and unfairly punishes Cleveland, can the Minister commit herself to reviewing it so that we can receive the funding we need to reopen that custody suite for my town?
Sarah Jones
I have spoken to forces in areas across the country where the distance that has to be travelled just to get to a custody suite is a disincentive to arrests, which is absolutely not the approach that we want to see. The challenges that we face are great, but we are reviewing the funding formula and will be establishing a fairer formula. The police estate has not received the investment that it should have received for a very long time. Our priority is to get police out into our communities, but we need to look at the estate as well.
Baggy Shanker (Derby South) (Lab/Co-op)
In Derby and Derbyshire, 71% of habitual knife carriers are aged 25 or under. Does the Minister agree that, in Derby and throughout the country, we need to provide a tailored support package so that we can break the cycle of young people’s involvement in knife crime and keep our communities safe?
Sarah Jones
Knife crime is horrific in all its forms, but there is something uniquely horrific about young people picking up knives and using them against other young people. There is a raft of interventions that we need to make and we are doing that through our action plan, but while the progress that we have seen so far is to be welcomed, it is not enough. Only when we reach our target and fulfil our ambition of halving knife crime will we know that we are actually making a difference and giving a future to those young people.