Knife crime crackdown targets hotspots with new mapping tech and school funding
£26m plan to pinpoint violence and boost policing comes alongside £1.2m for targeted school support – but campaigners warn it still won’t tackle the full scale of the crisis
Knife crime hotspots will be targeted using new mapping technology and school-based interventions as part of a major Government crackdown on violence.
Ministers say £26 million will be used to pinpoint the exact streets where knife crime is most likely to happen – with increased patrols, live facial recognition and knife detection arches rolled out in those areas.
Alongside that, a further £1.2 million will fund specialist training in up to 250 schools in the worst-affected areas, including mentoring for at-risk pupils and support for teachers to identify warning signs early.
The new “hyperlocal” mapping system, developed by the Home Office, will track knife crime down to as little as 100 square metres – including during peak times like the school run – allowing police to target resources more precisely.
Policing minister Sarah Jones said: “Knife crime devastates lives and families across the country, and the majority of it takes place on just a small number of streets.
“We will deploy state-of-the-art mapping to identify these hot spots and target them with police patrols, live facial recognition and knife arches to catch these criminals.”
Justice Secretary David Lammy said the plans were about “reaching young people before violence does” and giving them “the support they need to choose a different path”.
But Birmingham campaigner Alison Cope, whose son was murdered, says while the focus on hotspots could bring some benefits, it does not go far enough.
“For me, my only concern is we’ve been here many times before,” she told us. “Lots of money is thrown at hotspots, mentoring and interventions – but we haven’t seen a huge reduction.”
She warned that targeting specific areas risks missing the wider picture, with violence and fear affecting communities beyond those mapped zones.
“Focusing on hotspots is a good starting point, but we’ve seen fatal attacks in areas that weren’t hotspots,” she said. “We need to educate in every single school if we want to reduce knife crime.”
Ms Cope also raised concerns about how young people perceive the risk, saying fear is spreading regardless of location.
“When I speak to children, they often believe up to 90 per cent of their peers are carrying knives,” she said. “That fear is driving behaviour, and that’s not being addressed.”
The Government says the measures are part of a wider plan to halve knife crime over the next decade, with youth hubs also set to open in cities including Birmingham to provide support with jobs, wellbeing and crime prevention.
But Ms Cope warned that without a broader, joined-up approach – including mental health support and early intervention – the impact of the latest plans may be limited.
“If we just repeat the same approaches, we’ll get the same outcomes,” she said. “I just hope this isn’t another case of money being spent without real change.”