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<p>The Government is already taking a wide range of urgent measures to tack-le knife
crime. In April 2018, the Government published the Serious Violence Strategy that
set out action being taken to address serious violence and in particular the recent
increases in knife crime, gun crime and homicide. This set out 61 commitments that
the Government will be is taking forward to tackle violent crime. This includes new
legislation in the Offensive Weapons Bill, currently in the House of Lords, strengthening
police capability to act against violent crime, and a strong focus on prevention and
early intervention to stop more working with young people to encourage them to take
up positive activities rather than getting involved in crime, including serious violence.
The Bill is also introducing new Knife Crime Prevention Orders.</p><p><br>Alongside
the legislative measures in the Bill we are taking forward a number of other actions
including a national knife crime media campaign - #knifefree - supporting intervention
work in Hospital A&E departments by expanding our support to Redthread to introduce
its youth violence intervention work to include in hospitals in Birmingham and Nottingham,
as well as in London, to work with young people admitted with knife wounds. In May
2018, we launched a new round of the anti-knife crime Community Fund as part of the
Government’s commitment to early intervention and prevention to tackle serious violence.
We announced the successful 68 projects in bids on 2 August 2018 with total who are
receiving funding of £1.5 million in total, to support grass roots projects focused
on prevention and early intervention.</p><p><br>In addition, the Government continues
to encourage police forces to undertake a series of coordinated national weeks of
action to tackle knife crime under Operation Sceptre. The operation includes targeted
stop and searches, weapon sweeps of hotspot areas, test purchases of knives from retailers,
and educational events. The week commencing 17 September 2018 marked the most recent
week of action under Operation Sceptre, and it is expected that the next phase will
take place from 11-17 March.</p><p><br>Last October the Home Secretary announced further
measures to address violent crime including a consultation on new legal duty to underpin
a ‘public health’ approach to tackling serious violence, a new £200 million youth
endowment fund and an Independent review of drug misuse.</p><p><br>We have made significant
progress in delivering on our key commitments including:</p><p><br>• a new £22m Early
Intervention Youth Fund to support communities for early intervention and prevention
with young people;<br>• a new £3.6m National County Lines Co-ordination Centre to
tackle violent and exploitative criminal activity associated with county lines. The
NCLCC has co-ordinated two separate weeks of intensive <br>• law enforcement action
which has led to more than 1,000 arrests, over 1300 individuals safeguarded, and significant
seizures of weapons and drugs;</p><p><br>• the Offensive Weapons Bill, currently in
the House of Lords, is also introducing new Knife Crime Prevention Orders;<br>• £1.4m
to support a new national police capability to tackle gang related activity on social
media which will be fully operational later this year;<br>• established a cross party,
cross sector, Serious Violence Taskforce which is chaired by the Home Secretary to
oversee and drive this critical programme of work</p><p><br>• We have also agreed
a set of commitments with major retailers to prevent the underage sales of knives
more generally in their stores and online. The agreement also covers staff training
and displays and packag-ing. Tesco, eBay UK, Lidl UK, Amazon UK, Wilko, Argos, Asda,
Pound-land, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, John Lewis and Waitrose have all signed up to
the principles. They have since been joined by Boots, the Co-op, B&Q, Aldi, TKMaxx
and Debenhams. In addition, as part of the Serious Violence Strategy we will support
Trading Standards if they decide to prosecute a case in court through a specific prosecution
fund</p><p>In addition, the following measures are being introduced:</p><p><br>• a
new £200 million youth endowment fund. This will be delivered over 10 years and will
support interventions with children and young peo-ple at risk of involvement in crime
and violence. It will focus on those most at risk, such as those displaying signs
such as truancy, aggression and involvement in anti-social behaviour; funding interventions
to steer children and young people away from becoming serious offenders. In December
2018, we launched the bidding process to choose an organisation or consortium that
will run and administer the fund. The deadline for submissions was 23 January and
we are now assessing the bids received; and,<br>• an Independent review of drug misuse,
which is being led by Dame Carol Black. This will ensure law enforcement agencies
and policy are targeting and preventing the drug-related causes of violent crime effectively.
Drugs have been identified as a major driver of serious violence and this review will
look at recreational drug use, as well as considering use by the small number of users
who cause the most harm to themselves and their communities.</p>
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