Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking with the Metropolitan Police to deploy educational awareness campaigns aimed at reducing youth-related knife crime in London.

Halving knife crime over the next decade is a key part of the Government’s Safer Streets mission. We are taking a range of steps to realise this ambition. For example, we have banned Zombie style knives and zombie style machetes and are currently consulting on a ban of ninja swords. We are also creating a new Young Futures programme - intervening earlier to stop young people being drawn into crime. It is vital we have a system that can identify and support those young people who need it most.

The Home Office funds the London Violence Reduction Unit, a multiagency partnership which includes the Metropolitan Police, to understand and tackle the drivers of serious violence. London VRU supports delivery of a range of youth initiatives across London boroughs which raise awareness of the impact of knife crime, for example the Choices Weapons Awareness Programme, delivered across Camden secondary schools to increase understanding of the consequences of knife crime on families affected and deter knife-carrying.