Across the UK, knife-enabled crime recorded by the police saw a 10% increase to 49,027 offences in the year ending March 2022, from 44,642 in the year ending March 2021. There were increases across all knife-enabled violent and sexual offences except for attempted murder, which saw a 9% decrease (to 441 offences). (Lordslibrary.parliament.uk, 2022)
I write this as a working class man that grew up in London with a strong understanding of gang culture and the dynamics of knife crime that is now spiking across the United Kingdom, not solely in the larger cities, but across small towns and rural areas too.
I personally first experienced a knife attack when I was just in my teens and then many other attacks up to my most recent in 2019 in North London of which I came out of the situation untouched from the knife that was presented to me by an active gang at the time. I personally know others who have nearly died or been stabbed and I can honestly say 70% of them were people just going about their everyday business.
There are many reasons people carry knives and it is not always with the intent of attacking, it can actually be in the holder’s mindset a defensive approach that turns into an attacking approach because of a situation that has shown its self in front of them; for example a child is feeling vulnerable at school or outside school and he/she is a quiet child who does not mix with gangs in or outside school. He/she knows many others carry knifes and they then personally decided to carry a knife because it makes them feel safer, and then circumstances result in them using the knife during a violent altercation.
I must make it clear, I am not justifying any carrying of knives, or any other weapon, but we need to explore the route causes further and understand them in order to tackle a culture that is spreading across the UK, seemingly spiraling out of control.
Another key fact we all tend to ignore is we have kids not even in their teens willing to stab another human being; the psychology associated with such a close contact attack is profound, and questions need to raised about the involvement of schools in educating and providing interventions..
There is clearly a serious problem in the United Kingdom with knife crime and gang culture and with youth clubs and free activities no longer being available in all of our communities, we as the community need to opportunities and activities for youths.
The real need focuses on interventions to prevent our youths from crossing the line by engaging in criminal acts resulting in serious harm or loss of life. Work in the non-criminal space need to be undertaken throughout our communities; we know there are some really good charities bridging the gaps, but there is still a long way to go, and we need more community resources.
If you refer back to our blog, Raising awareness of Prevent,
we mentioned the governments Prevent strategy, part of Contest, the counter terrorism strategy. This outlines the causes for people being drawn into terrorism; there are similarities in the psychologies here; for a child that grows up with little or no family, the concept of gangs and the culture that goes with it, fills that missing void for the individual but at his/her cost from a prison cell for years as the criminal or as a victim with serious injury or death.
In this blog post I am looking at it from a concept of why this is happening but unfortunately there is also the element of manipulation and grooming vulnerable children to engage in criminal activities such as, county-lines drug dealing.
Although we don’t have the capacity to eradicate knife-crime, at IPR we have our Making a Difference Pledge, and we believe in strength in unity. As supporters of IPR, by reading this blog you are already Making a Difference, but if you are now asking yourself, what can I do? We ask that you look at your local communities, what services are available and highlight those that are providing the interventions needed, get involved, whether its through volunteering your time, or by spreading the word, you will make a difference. If you have no community schemes, youth clubs etc. in your area, write to your local MP or attend their local surgery to discuss the needs within your community, and finally, you can always contact us to discuss ideas and initiatives and see how we can help.