London knife crime is spiralling out of control due to cuts by local councils and a lack of investment in the capital’s infrastructure, the CEO of the Ben Kinsella Trust said Tuesday.
“Knife crimes are mostly gang-related even though it’s difficult to say. Knife crime is significant high since 2014,” Patrick Green told the Holloway Express.
Out of 47 recent murders in the capital, 31 were stabbings and 40% of them were gang-related.
“The main reasons are of contextual causes, lack of investments in infrastructure and general council cuts,” added the CEO.
London is a vivid portrait of how -after £28 million were cut from youth services, 457 youth worker jobs were lost and 36 youth centres were shut down- the crime rate has risen a whopping 50% in only one year.
Things could get better – but not right away, Green said.
“Now thanks to the Violent Crime Strategy, developed by [London Mayor] Sadiq Khan, it’s possible to see that politicians are beginning to be interested. But sadly it will take time,” said Green.
He said that the only way teenagers can be helped is through changing their mindset: it’s only thanks to education that teenagers can learn the danger of carrying knives.
Knife crime in north London this week took its latest victim: a 20-year-old in Seven Sisters Road, Finsbury Park on April 21st.
The murder is the 62nd fatal knife crime incident from the beginning of the year. The “bloodbath” has risen by 21 % since 2017.
“I used to work at night. Now I can’t after what happened,” said Holloway resident Joanna Williams, 30.
The facts tell a tragedy of a city with 12,980 knife crime offences this year, with a crime rate that in February 2018 overtook that of New York City.
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Islington is regarded as the most dangerous borough of London as it has the highest number of reported crimes (29,409 ) after the borough of Ealing. In fact, four fatal stabbings were registered in north London since January 2018, making a total of 120 stabbings in London in 2018.
Teenagers “carry knives because of protection or because they are influenced by friends. We work to educate them about the danger of knives,” Green said.