Ahead of the Home Secretary’s meeting with the England Football Team in a bid to urge young people not to carry knives, Ross Hendry, Head of Policy at Action for Children, the children’s charity, says:
“It is great that the England Football Team are getting behind the fight against knife crime and raising awareness of this issue, but if we really want to find lasting solutions to this problem, we need to engage with young people to find out why so many of them are getting caught up in gun and knife crime in the first place.
“We know through our work nearly one in three (1) young people have been affected by gun and knife crime. We need to remember that they are more often victims rather than perpetrators of this type of crime. We must stop demonising and start involving them in this debate, especially the most vulnerable youngsters who are often the ones most affected but whose voices often go unheard.”
Notes to editors
1. The results of Action for Children’s consultation into Gun and Knife Crime published in April 2008.
2. Action for Children is one of the UK’s leading children’s charities, working in partnership to run nearly 500 services for more than 178,000 of the UK’s most vulnerable children, young people and their families.
