09 October 2023 , 18:39
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I still remember the phone call five years ago.
I still remember the shock, quickly followed by the devastation of coming to terms with the news that my next door neighbour Aaron had been fatally stabbed. He was just 41.
His family don’t like to talk about the details so I won’t regurgitate them here.
Suffice to say that we’d all grown up together.
We played together, ate together, celebrated the summer holidays together as kids and our families were in each other’s houses at Christmas and New Year.
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As an adult he had his own kids who we’d often see at his parents’ home, next to my parents’, when we went back to visit.
We were back there to console them after his death ripped his family apart in May 2018. I can’t begin to tell you about the tears that were shed.
They are on my mind as Labour Conference week continues. We need a national strategy on knife crime. A plan. A solution to the epidemic claiming lives and crippling families.
Among his five national missions, announced last month, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer promised to halve knife crime. But how?
In February this year it was reported that the number of knife-related homicides has reached its highest level since records began more than 70 years ago with four in 10 of all murders now involving a blade.
And yet, Ministry of Justice figures reveal just 30% of 19,086 offences relating to knives over the past year lead to the culprit being locked up.
We are knee-deep in a public health crisis in this country. A cycle of stabbings, heartbreak, teenagers arrested and charged, pledges to do better only for another young life to be snuffed out with no tangible policy anywhere near being in place.
We need action. A way forward to suggest we can find a solution.
Clearly from the misdirection and the poison of the Tory Party Conference last week, they don’t have one.
So here is a chance for Labour to give families like Elianne Andam ’s hope that they can send their kids to school without fearing they will never return home.
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Amnesties don’t work.
At one knife bin in South London, it was claimed last week that many of the weapons put in have been taken out by others for use on the street. Where else is that happening around the country?
We know all about the indicators – poverty, low opportunity, domestic abuse, substance abuse, adverse childhood experiences and so much more.
Youth clubs for pool, table tennis and the like are a thing of the past. Successive governments scrapped them as they made kids an afterthought.
Let’s not follow the Tories with their soundbites. We’ve heard them all before.
Only a real plan will restore confidence and rebuild trust – and save lives.