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Government would support knife arches in schools

Simon Gilbert
BBC Political Reporter, Coventry and Warwickshire•@TheSimonGilbert
BBC Diana Johnson looks at the camera. She is wearing a navy blouse and red eyeglasses. She has brown shoulder length hair and is standing in front of Coventry Cathedral.BBC
Diana Johnson, the Government's Policing Minister, said she would support head teachers who wanted to install knife arches in schools.

Installing metal detecting knife arches in schools and nightclubs would be supported by the government if they were "appropriate", the policing minister has said.

Diana Johnson, however, said those decisions should be "made locally".

She was speaking during a visit to Coventry as part of Knife Crime Awareness Week.

The West Midlands Police area recently saw a drop in the number of knife crime incidents - meaning it no longer has the highest rate of knife crime in the country.

The minister discussed how the government would be working with the force to help meet a national target of halving knife crime over the next decade.

Diana Johnson, policing minister, speaks to two West Midlands Police officers in Coventry city centre. They have their backs to the camera and are wearing yellow high visibility police vests and hard police helmets. There is a female officer to the left and a male officer to the right with the minister in the centre facing towards them.
Policing Minister Diana Johnson visited Coventry city centre to see what police were doing to tackle knife crime

Asked about installing knife arches in nightclubs and schools after several incidents involving young people in the region over recent years, she said: "I'm open to looking at anything that keeps the public safe.

"I think in schools, if schools if head teachers think that's appropriate then I would support them in that.

"But I think it is very much down to what actions are most appropriate for the setting you're talking about."

Policing Minister Diana Johnson watches on as schoolchildren at St Gregory's Primary School in Coventry take part in a virtual reality knife crime session run by West Midlands Police. The children are wearing white VR headsets which cover their eyes. A Police Community Support Officer has his back to the camera while he instructs wearing a yellow high visibility vest.
Pupils at St Gregory's Primary School in Coventry took part in a virtual reality knife crime session run by police

It was recently announced that the number of weapon surrender bins in the West Midlands is to double.

People are able to dispose of knives and weapons in the metal containers, with 1,705 weapons surrendered in the West Midlands Police area between January and March, which were later destroyed.

That equates to 142 weapons deposited each week, or more than 20 per day.

Ch Supt Paul Joyce looks at the camera wearing a flat police cap, yellow high visibility vest with a walkie talkie on the left side of his chest and the word police in white writing with a blue background beneath. He is standing outside a church surrounded by greenery.
Ch Supt Paul Joyce said West Midlands Police had been successful in reducing gang-related knife crime

The recent haul included hundreds of flick knives, zombie knives, kitchen knives, knuckle dusters, machetes and even firearms.

Ch Supt Paul Joyce, who is responsible for policing across the whole of Coventry, told the BBC that part of the success was down to working with schoolchildren and tackling gang-related crime.

He said: "We've got really good processes in place to identify gang members and proactively target them to ensure that they are not a risk to each other and to the wider community."

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