Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to reduce knife crime in London.

Whilst the Mayor of London has operational responsibility for policing in the capital, this Government is committed to providing additional resources to the police and their partners to tackle violent crime and make our streets safer.

To support the prevention of violence in London, we have allocated the London Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) c.£33.7m since 2019, including a

c.£12.6m allocation for this financial year (2022/23). The VRU also received an additional investment of £5.5m in 2021/22 to deliver specific, highly targeted interventions to vulnerable young people. The London VRU delivers multiple initiatives that are projected to support over 5,300 young people in the capital next year.

We are also providing additional funding to enable the Metropolitan Police to increase enforcement activity where most violence occurs, through our Grip programme (previously known as Surge). The Metropolitan Police have been allocated approximately £50.9m over the last three years, including £7.9m for this financial year (2022/23) for Grip. Through this programme, the Metropolitan Police are delivering data-driven, targeted visible patrols to suppress violence where it is most concentrated.

Whilst the Mayor of London has operational responsibility for policing in the capital, the Government continues to encourage police forces to undertake a series of coordinated national weeks of action to tackle knife crime under Operation Sceptre. The latest phase of the operation took place between 16 to 22 May 2022. In the Metropolitan and City Police areas 126 knives were seized during enforcement action with a further 90 being surrendered or seized during sweeps.

The Home Office has invested £200m over 10 years in early intervention and prevention initiatives to help children and young people at risk of exploitation and involvement in serious violence, through the Youth Endowment Fund (YEF). This will support how the Government responds to serious violence by identifying what works in diverting children and young people away from involvement in serious violence. Currently the YEF has invested around £50m on interventions and evaluations around London.

Grip, VRU & YEF funding are provided in addition to the commitment to increase the number of police officers in England and Wales by 20,000 by March 2023. As of 30 June 2022, the MPS has recruited an additional 2,952 uplift officers against a total three-year allocation of 4,557 officers.