£18m needed to fight knife crimes

London: More than £18 million (Dh106 million) extra is to be spent on tackling knife-crime and gun and gang culture over the next two years, the home secretary, Theresa May, announced yesterday.

She said the funding was being made available "on the back of" a report into knife crime by former actor Brooke Kinsella, whose brother, Ben, was stabbed to death at the age of 16 three years ago.

The report by Kinsella, who was appointed last year as an adviser on knife crime to the home secretary, yesterday published calls for anti-knife crime presentations in schools and more preventative work to stop teenagers getting involved in knife and gun crime and a scheme to tackle the "fear and fashion factor" of carrying knives.

"Brooke Kinsella has done a great job in highlighting what works and what could work better in trying to achieve that," said the home secretary yesterday.

"Off the back of Brooke's recommendations, we will invest money into changing attitudes and behaviour, alongside being tough on those who persist in being involved in senseless crimes."

Devastating impact

At the London launch of her report, Kinsella, said: "People aren't shocked anymore by the stabbing of a child and that is not right. There is no more time for talk. I really believe the problem of knife crime has escalated in the past few years, and the impact it has on communities and families is devastating."

She said that local knife crime projects needed more stable funding so they could plan ahead with fewer box-ticking regulations.

The former EastEnders actor said that prevention was the keyword, and schools needed to take the problem more seriously with children as young as 10 given anti-knife crime awareness lessons in schools.

There were also "gaps" in the projects available, she said, and more work to tackle knife-wielding girl gangs was also needed.

— Guardian News & Media Ltd