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<p>Since 2019, the Home Office has provided over £43m of funding for a London Violence
Reduction Unit (VRU) (including £9.5m this year) which is providing a multi-agency,
preventative response designed to tackle the drivers of serious violence and knife
crime. In addition, we have invested over £60m (including c.£8.9m this year) in ‘hotspot
policing’ to boost the policing response to serious violence in London and provide
high-visibility police patrols and problem-solving tactics in the streets and neighbourhoods
most affected.</p><p>VRUs are tasked with investing in evidence-based approaches designed
to steer vulnerable young people away from involvement in violence. As part of this
approach, the London VRU is funding local interventions in Enfield including an outreach
and detached youth team which delivers after school activities and creative sessions,
1-1 holistic support for young people, mentoring sessions and sports sessions for
children and young people. Alongside this, the policing hot spot response programme
is targeting key locations in Enfield Town and Fore Street. In addition to additional
visible police patrols, policing interventions delivered through this programme in
Enfield have included work to prevent robberies of school pupils and work to target
males who were assaulting sex workers.</p><p>The government is also taking forward
a programme of national activity to drive down knife crime. This includes recent consultation
on new legislative proposals, including a ban of zombie-style knives and machetes.
The government response was published on 30 August 2023. Following careful consideration
of the responses to the consultation, a Statutory Instrument was laid in Parliament
on 25 January 2024. Once the legislation has been approved by Parliament, a surrender
scheme will be launched this summer to remove these items from our streets and once
this has been completed, the manufacture, supply, sale and possession of zombie-style
knives and machetes will be outlawed from 24 September 2024. This will cover face
to face and online sales.</p><p>Additionally, through the Criminal Justice Bill 2023,
which is currently progressing through parliament, we are providing more powers for
police to seize knives held in private that they believe will be used for unlawful
violence, increasing the maximum penalty for the offences of selling prohibited weapons
and selling knives to under 18s and creating a new offence of possessing an article
with blade or point or an offensive weapon with intent to commit unlawful violence.</p>
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