- Labour leader suggested parents should consider handing knives into amnesties
Parents have a role to play to ensure their children do not carry knives, Sir Keir Starmer said yesterday as he launched a crime crackdown.
Speaking exclusively to the Daily Mail, the Labour leader suggested parents should consider handing knives into amnesties to help prevent violence.
Yesterday he unveiled a plan to tackle the ‘epidemic’ of knife crime – promising to end ‘apology letters’ that allow youths carrying blades to dodge charges.
Instead, under Labour he said every offender would be given a ‘bespoke action plan’ to prevent reoffending – alongside parental interventions.
Launching the £100 million a year plan on a visit to Milton Keynes police station yesterday, Sir Keir told the Mail that he was ‘struck’ by how many parents hand in blades to the authorities.
Speaking exclusively to the Daily Mail, the Labour leader suggested parents should consider handing knives into amnesties to help prevent violence
Bundles of clothing representing the lives lost to knife crime in the UK, beside Parliament Square in London, on January 8
Clothing representing the human cost of UK knife crime is placed in Parliament Square in London, on January 8
Officers showed the Labour leader and Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, boxes of knives collected through amnesties.
In an interview afterwards, he said: ‘I was struck by the fact that family members, including parents, are sometimes handing those knives in.
‘Parents, understanding that something may be going wrong and deciding to take the action of getting rid of whatever it is that might be used.’
Sir Keir added: ‘A parent being involved and knowing that they could be part of the support… Every knife in those amnesty bins was not just a knife, it was a life. And that is quite poignant. Parents who feel confident to play their part are very important in that.’
Ms Cooper said schools, neighbourhood police, youth offending teams and parents have a collective role to play.
‘Clearly we want parents to be involved and to be taking action and to be making sure that everything possible is being done.
‘When you’ve got young people starting to get drawn into gang activity or have been caught carrying knives this is immensely serious, and there’s a real danger that things escalate and get worse and that you end up with lives being lost.’
Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer and Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper. Ms Cooper said schools, neighbourhood police, youth offending teams and parents have a collective role to play
Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer and Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper are shown boxes of Knives during a visit to Milton Keynes Police station
Zombie knives (File Photo). New measures to crack down on zombie knives and machetes will be introduced in England and Wales from September, the government has announced
Labour has also pledged to restore ‘respect’ in Britain with the introduction of new measures to stamp out anti-social behaviour.
The party has pledged to bring in ‘Respect Orders’ to tackle persistent offenders – with the power to arrest those who breach them.
Sir Keir said anti-social behaviour ‘absolutely devastates people’, and said there has been ‘a loss of respect across the board’ which has got worse across the country.
‘Twenty million people are affected by antisocial behaviour, one in 10 people has had to move house.
‘We can’t tolerate it and let it go on. These respect orders are about respect, but they have got to have teeth. If you have a respect order and you breach it, you’re going to get arrested.’
