Violent Crime
Debate between Victoria Atkins and Richard Burden(5 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)
I recommend to the Minister the youth violence intervention programme run by Redthread, which sees trained youth workers embedded in A&E departments at certain hospitals in Birmingham, Nottingham and elsewhere to intervene and win the confidence of young victims of violent crime at a time that can make a real difference in breaking the cycle of their involvement in violent crime. It is a great project, but what assurance can she give me that such projects will receive the sustainable funding they need so that they can be rolled out into every A&E department in the country?
Victoria Atkins
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for mentioning the work of Redthread. The Home Office is investing in Redthread’s projects in Nottingham, Birmingham and London hospitals, and I have seen its work at close hand. I am very impressed by what Redthread does.
We will, of course, look at rolling out the project further, but I hesitate because some A&E departments thankfully do not see the levels of knife crime that perhaps London, Nottingham and Birmingham do. We have invested in those hospitals because we are targeting funding at hotspot areas, but we will look at where the project could assist by being rolled out further.