PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Machetes: Consultation - 18 April 2023 (Commons/Commons Chamber)

With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement on legislative proposals to tackle the use of machetes and other large knives in crime.

Knife crime causes misery and fear in our communities, which is why over many years this Government have taken concerted action to tackle it. We are pursuing a twin-track approach, combining tough enforcement with prevention and intervention as we relentlessly bear down on violent crime, and we are supporting the police every step of the way in that effort. We have given forces more powers and more resources to go after criminals and take knives and dangerous weapons off our streets, and we have legislated over time to tighten the law.

The results are clear to see. Since 2019, the police have removed over 90,000 knives and dangerous weapons through stop and search, surrender programmes and other targeted police action. Violence, as measured by the crime survey, is down by 38% since 2010, and hospital admissions as a result of injuries caused by a bladed article and where the victim is below the age of 25 are down by 24% since 2019. This is really important work: every knife or weapon taken off the streets has the potential to save lives. We have also invested significantly in violence reduction units to bring together agencies to tackle the drivers of serious violence at a local level. We have introduced Grip—hotspot policing to tackle enforcement in areas with particular problems—and have established the £200 million Youth Endowment Fund to fund innovative diversionary activities.

The combination of violence reduction units and targeted hotspot policing has prevented an estimated 136,000 violent offences in the first three years of funded delivery, and tomorrow we will launch a pilot of serious violence reduction orders to give the police an automatic right to stop and search convicted knife offenders. Every offender issued with an SVRO will face an increased likelihood of being stopped by the police and, if they persist in carrying weapons, will be sent back to prison or brought before the courts. That follows the start of the offensive weapons homicide review pilot on 1 April, which will see local partners work together to review the circumstances of certain homicides where the death of a person aged over 18 is likely to have involved the use of an offensive weapon.

Through our police uplift programme, of course, we are recruiting thousands more officers—we will get the figures next week, but we confidently expect those to confirm that we have record numbers of police officers in England and Wales. That is something that I am sure Members across the House will welcome very strongly, along with the 38% reduction in violence since 2010.

However, as the public would expect, we keep our approach under constant review, and where improvements can be made, we will not hesitate to act. It is in that context that we have today launched a seven-week consultation on new proposals to go even further to tackle the use of certain machetes and other bladed articles in crime.

The UK already has some of the strictest knife legislation in the world, and the police already have broad powers to tackle knife crime. Our new proposals to go even further have been developed in co-operation with the National Police Chiefs’ Council knife crime lead, but also in consultation with Members of this House who have brought forward constituency cases illustrating the need to go further.

I pay particular tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Anna Firth), who brought forward an example of a knife that was legal that was used in an offence in Southend. That knife will be illegal once these changes are made. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes)—I see him in his place—who also highlighted constituency cases of knife crime. Finally, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelsea and Fulham (Greg Hands) raised the case of one of his constituents, who was robbed using a machete in broad daylight on the streets of Chelsea. I thank those Members and others for bringing these issues to the attention of the Home Office, and it is in response to their constructive campaigning and to the police that we are taking even further action today.

We have identified certain types of machetes and large outdoor knives that do not appear to have a practical use and appear to be designed to look menacing and to be favoured by those who want to use knives as weapons. We intend to ban those weapons, going further than the weapons ban already introduced in the Offensive Weapons Act 2019, particularly under section 47, with which I am sure Opposition Members are familiar. That means it will be an offence to import, manufacture, sell or supply any of these weapons. We also believe that the criminal justice system should treat carrying prohibited knives and offensive weapons in public more seriously, to better reflect the severity of the offences, and we are consulting on that point.

In addition, we are proposing to toughen the current penalties for selling prohibited offensive weapons and for selling bladed articles to under-18s. Under our proposals, the maximum penalty for those offences would be increased to two years’ imprisonment. We are also consulting on whether to provide the police with additional powers to enable them to seize, retain and destroy bladed articles of any length held in private where they are intended for criminal use, or whether the powers should be limited to articles of a certain length. We consider that to be a proportionate response. When discussing it this morning in Brixton police station with the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead, they certainly strongly welcomed those additional powers.

Finally, we are consulting on whether it would be appropriate to mirror firearms legislation and introduce a separate offence of possessing a knife or offensive weapon with intent to injure or cause fear of violence, with a maximum penalty higher than the current offence of straight possession. In addition to publication on gov.uk, I will place in the Library copies of the consultation document and the accompanying impact assessment, and I encourage Members on both sides to respond to that.

Knife crime is a menace that has no place in society. It can destroy families and leave lives devastated. We have shown time and again that this Government will always put the interests of the law-abiding majority and victims first. We have given our police forces more officers, we have given them more powers, and now we are seeking to go even further. We are relentlessly focused on driving down crime, and I trust that Members on both sides of the House will support these measures.

Of the statement?

There were one or two points I added in reference to Members here, but in substance no. I am happy to try to work out what happened afterwards.

I certainly admire the shadow Minister’s sense of humour. Let me pick up some of the points she made. She asked about police numbers. As I have said, the figures that will be released on the 26th will show, I am confident, that we have more police officers than at any time in our country’s history, including more police officers than at any point in the time in office of the last Labour Government.

The shadow Minister asked about crime figures. I will repeat the point I made before: only one dataset is considered reliable by the Office for National Statistics and that is the crime survey of England and Wales. It shows that, since 2010, violent offending has dropped by 38%, criminal damage is down 62%, burglary is down 56%, robbery is down 55% and overall crime, excluding fraud and computer misuse, is down 30%. When will the shadow Home Secretary, who was a Minister in that Government, apologise for the fact that crime was double the level it is now under this Government?

The shadow Minister asked about the changes we are making today. This Government have been progressively tightening the legislation over the years, including the Offensive Weapons Act 2019. We have been continuously reviewing that legislation. Where we find opportunities to make it stronger and more effective in response to Members of the House and the police, we will take those opportunities, and that is what we are now doing. If there are some specific comments on the length of knives, that is exactly what the consultation is designed to capture. I strongly urge the shadow Minister to respond to the consultation. I look forward to receiving the extremely considered and detailed submission that she is no doubt working on already.

Finally, in relation to recent trends in the data, the most reliable source of information on serious violence is hospital admissions where the victim has received a knife wound. Over the past three years, for victims under the age of 25, those have reduced by 24%. There is a lot more to do, but the direction of travel is clearly right and this Government are committed to going even further.

My right hon. Friend makes a very good point and is right to remind the House of our much-loved former colleague Sir David’s tragic death at the hands of a knife-wielding attacker. He asks two questions. First, yes, I can confirm that zombie knives that do not have any writing on them will be covered by the proposals. Sub-paragraph (iii) in section 47(2) of the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 has a requirement that there are threatening words on the blade, and we have reached the conclusion that that is unduly restrictive. It is not something that anyone, including the Opposition, complained about at the time the Bill passed, but on further reflection and following input from colleagues, such as my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West, we think that that change needs to be made, and I can confirm that it will be.

In relation to my right hon. Friend’s question, and the shadow Minister’s question, about sales online, people directly selling online prohibited items is obviously just straight-up illegal. In relation to selling on marketplaces, following discussions with colleagues in the new Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, I have been assured that the Online Safety Bill will cover online marketplaces when it comes to selling items like this, so with the passage of the Online Safety Bill, the kind of provisions he is asking for will apply.

I thank the Select Committee Chair for her question. I do not accept that the previous initiatives have been unsuccessful. I have already pointed to the steady reduction in hospital admissions as a result of knife wounds and the steady reduction in violent offences, as measured by the crime survey for England and Wales. The Government have successively tightened the law and we are tightening it further today. We have also put more and more resources successively into tackling the social problem that the Select Committee Chair rightly highlights. For example, the violence reduction units are now putting a great deal of money into the 20 police force areas where violent crime is most serious. The Youth Endowment Fund has £200 million to spend on targeted, evidence-based interventions to help young people into a better future. I have visited some of the programmes that have been run—by Everton football club in Merseyside, to give one example. I was in Brixton in south London earlier today, hearing about the community work that happens there. I think the process we are following is successively increasing resources, investing in diversionary activities for young people and successively strengthening the law where evidence emerges that that is necessary. It is over time yielding results; I set out the data at the beginning of my answer.

I agree with my hon. Friend. The laws we pass here, whether on this topic or on any other, are only meaningful to the extent that they are properly enforced. It is my view, as it is his, that when the police arrest somebody in possession of a knife, they should follow up. There should be a prosecution and, where appropriate, there should be custody as well, or there should be rehabilitative work, where that is appropriate, as well. So I entirely agree with him. With the extra resources and extra officers the police are getting, they have the bandwidth now to do that. Our expectation across this House—on both sides—and certainly in the Home Office is that the police do do that.

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his moving and powerful description of the awful tragedy that has affected the family of his constituent. The way he described that incident illustrates powerfully to the whole House why it is so important that all of us work to eradicate the scourge of knife crime. Yes, I can give him the commitment he asked for: we will proceed as quickly as we possibly can. Some of the proposals can be done in secondary legislation. We will do that as quickly as we can following the conclusion of the seven-week consultation—it is quite a short consultation, because we want to get on with this. Where primary legislation is needed, we will aim to do that as quickly as we can in the following Session, so, yes, I can give him that assurance.

Can I start by paying tribute again to my hon. Friend for her tireless and very effective campaigning on this topic? This issue is a good example of Members of Parliament raising constituency issues that have led to what I hope will very shortly be a change in the law. In relation to retailers, we intend to be very strict with retailers. The ban will apply to machetes where there is no obvious legitimate purpose, and retailers will be committing a criminal offence if they sell them. We should have no tolerance at all, as she says, for any retailer who seeks to circumvent or break the law by selling machetes that are—that will be—banned.

On the first point regarding existing legislation, certain kinds of zombie knives were banned under the Offensive Weapons Act 2019, but as I said earlier, sub-paragraph (iii) in section 47(2) of the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 banned only zombie knives that have threatening writing on them, and we are now filling that gap in response to feedback.

On the second point about youth services, I agree that prevention is a critical part of the strategy—it is not just about enforcement; it is about prevention as well, and that includes providing alternatives for young people. That is why we have set up the Youth Endowment Fund, with £200 million to fund evidence-based activity, and it is why violence reduction units and project Grip programmes are directing funding at the 20 police forces, including the Metropolitan police, where those services are most desperately needed.

I thank my hon. Friend for his tireless campaigning on this issue, and his local paper which I know has been raising it as well. I am sorry to hear what he says about the Labour PCC in the west midlands. I urge all PCCs to engage with their local communities and I am particularly shocked and concerned to hear that the west midlands PCC is apparently considering closing down 20 police stations.

I am glad the right hon. Gentleman likes the statement and I will try to provide further such statements in the future given that there is clearly an appetite for them from his side of the Chamber.

On moving the dial, there is clearly no one solution to a problem like knife crime—there is no silver bullet; no one measure will fix the problem in totality—but I do think that these proposals will move the needle. I saw a knife today in Brixton police station that is currently legal; it was a zombie knife without lettering on it and therefore does not fall within the scope of section 47 of the 2019 Act. It is legal today, but under these proposals it will be illegal, meaning people cannot sell it, market it, import it, manufacture it or even possess it in private. I spoke to the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead today about the totality of these measures and he was very clear that he thinks this will make a difference. It will not solve the problem on its own, but I think it will make a difference.

On police numbers, the figures will be unveiled at 9.30 on 26 April—next Wednesday—so the right hon. Gentleman will have to bear with me until then. However, I am very confident, as I have said once or twice already, that we will have record numbers of officers—more than we have ever had at any time in the history of policing in England and Wales.

My hon. Friend speaks words of great wisdom and I agree with every single one of them.

I agree completely with the right hon. Gentleman’s sentiments and those expressed previously by the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden). Speed is important: we want to do this as quickly as we can, and that is one reason it is a seven-week consultation rather than longer. As I said earlier, we will take forward measures in secondary legislation as quickly as we can, and will also handle as quickly as possible those that need primary legislation.

I agree with the point about the need to avoid loopholes, and in that spirit I strongly encourage Members of this House and people outside it with an interest in this topic—whether charities or anyone else—to reply to the consultation on those points of detail. The shadow policing Minister, the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones) raised some questions about the length of particular knives; that is the kind of detail we need to get right and the consultation is the vehicle through which we can make sure the details are comprehensively captured exactly as the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) suggests.

Some important steps were taken through the Offensive Weapons Act 2019. The Financial Secretary to the Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins) is in the Chamber, and in a previous ministerial post she took that important legislation through the House. We propose to go further now: rather than introducing a licensing scheme, we propose to ban completely the machetes and zombie knives that are not currently illegal. Instead of requiring a licensing regime, it will simply be illegal to sell, market, import, manufacture or privately possess those particular knives.

I recognise many of the causal factors the hon. Lady describes from her experience in West Ham. In Croydon, we see similar social problems that need to be addressed. Quite a lot of investment is now going into those areas. There is more money going into mental health. I mentioned already, in response to previous questions, the money going into the Youth Endowment Fund. The violence reduction units are designed to work with young people and get them on to a better path. I was talking to officers in Brixton in south London earlier today. They were telling me how they will use their extra officers. The sergeant from Lambeth talked about how they are going to try to work with families of young people as young as nine who are beginning to head down the wrong path. So, I agree that those are exactly the things we need to work on. Investment is being made and we are on the right path.

My hon. Friend and fellow London MP asks a very good and pertinent question. The Metropolitan police currently takes between 350 and 400 knives off the streets of London every month using regular stop and search, so we should be clear that it is an important tactic that keeps our constituents and fellow citizens safe. Scan and search has enormous potential for covertly or discreetly scanning people as they walk down the street and detecting those who are carrying knives. I strongly encourage police forces up and down the country, not just the Metropolitan police, to adopt that kind of technology to ensure they identify more knives and take them off our streets.

One of the reasons we are hiring extra officers—and why we are confident we will have record numbers when the figures are unveiled next week—is to ensure we have a visible police presence not just in our cities and towns, but in villages up and down the country as well. In terms of action on buying zombie knives, the seven-week consultation launched today, combined with the provisions in the Online Safety Bill, are designed to address that problem. It is important, as the hon. Gentleman says, and that is why the Government are acting.

Yes, I absolutely agree that stop and search is a vital tool. I mentioned a few minutes ago that every month in London alone stop and search takes between 350 and 400 knives off our streets—knives that could be used to injure or even kill our fellow citizens—so I completely agree with that point. And yes, of course I would be delighted to meet my hon. Friend.

I am afraid I do not have the prosecution figures to hand, but I will certainly write to the hon. Gentleman with them. They are quite substantial. I agree with his general point that legislating is important but that, on its own, it is not enough. It is important that we legislate and that the police have the relevant powers, and it is important that we criminalise dangerous knives, as we are going to do, but we also need to ensure that there are enough police to enforce those laws, hence the police recruitment programme. It is important to have the right youth services, hence the Youth Endowment Fund and the violence reduction units that are being invested in, and the hotspot policing via the Grip programme, where the police identify particular hotspots and have surge policing in those areas. He is right that we need to do all those things. By comprehensively tackling this together, we can continue to make sure that the violent crime figures go down.

I have talked a lot about the measures being taken to tackle the causes of knife crime: the Youth Endowment Fund, the violence reduction units and the Grip hotspot surge policing. I think the west midlands is one of the 20 forces that receives those interventions, as we would expect given the problems. On police numbers, I believe we will hit record numbers across England and Wales. There are some individual forces where police and crime commissioners have chosen, over the last five or 10 years, not to use their precept flexibility to raise more funds, and that does have a consequence. That is an issue the hon. Lady should raise with her local police and crime commissioner.

Actually, the Metropolitan police already has record numbers. The most recent published figures show that it has roughly 35,000 police officers compared to a previous peak of 33,000, so the Met already has record numbers. From talking to the commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, I know that he intends to place an emphasis on neighbourhood policing. In fact, earlier today a neighbourhood sergeant in Brixton, Lambeth confirmed that the neighbourhood policing units across the three wards he looks after have gone up already.

Overall, total homicide has gone down slightly over the last three years—by about 7%, speaking from memory. We should welcome that reduction. One of the reasons for legislating is that we are concerned that some of the very dangerous knives are being used in knife-enabled homicide, as the hon. Gentleman describes. One of the issues with zombie knives is their double-serrated and jagged edges: if somebody is stabbed it causes serious internal injuries, which trauma surgeons and A&E consultants tell us are more likely to lead to serious injury or even death. Precisely for that reason, we are bringing forward these changes.

As I said in my previous answer, the knives that we are talking about with serrated edges and jagged shapes tend to cause the worst injuries, because of the internal damage that they cause when somebody is stabbed with them. However, the hon. Gentleman makes some valid points, and I would be happy to engage with him and others to see if there are areas where we can go further.

I am sure that all in the House extend their condolences to the bereaved family in Luton for the incident that the hon. Lady described. We have talked about youth services quite extensively. Significant investment is being made via the Youth Endowment Fund, which is an evidence-based programme to put money into interventions that are proven to work using data. The violence reduction units in the 20 police force areas with the most significant challenges are funding local services to help young people in particular—in some cases as young as nine—on to a better path for the future. Those measures are working collectively. Violent crime is down by 38% since 2010, but clearly cases such as the one she mentioned mean that we cannot be complacent. There is more work to do. I am confident that by working together we can overcome the scourge of knife crime.