Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to tackle youth offending in Eastbourne.

In 2025/26 the Home Office is investing over £1.04m in grant funding to the Sussex Violence Reduction Unit, alongside £269k to continue the implementation of the Serious Violence Duty. This funding will support delivery of a range of early intervention and prevention programmes, which includes the continuation of a Focussed Deterrence intervention in East Sussex. This project is targeted at young people who carry knives and provides them with tailored multi-agency support to desist from violence, alongside enforcement measures.

We are also investing more than £43m in the County Lines Programme this financial year to target exploitative drug dealing gangs and break the organised crime groups behind the trade. Through our County Lines Programme, we are funding the National County Lines Co-ordination Centre to monitor the intelligence picture and co-ordinate the national law enforcement response. We also have a dedicated fund to help local police forces, including Sussex Police, tackle the scourge of county lines.

Going further, the Young Futures Programme is a key part of the Safer Streets Mission and will help deliver the Government’s target to halve knife crime over the next decade. Under this programme the Government will intervene earlier, to ensure Children and Young People (CYP) who are facing poorer outcomes and are vulnerable to being drawn into crime are identified and offered support in a more systematic way. The programme also aims to create more support and opportunities for them in their communities.