As the thread has broadened to other crime types, this ONS site makes interesting reading, showing that violent crime has been falling year on year as has murder. Table 1 is helpful incomparing different crimes over a 20 year period in one graphic.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulat...on%20offences).
But as Kerr sats knife and blunt instrument crime has notable increased which is where I think significant resource needs to go now. However, I don't think that locking young people up, many of whom have been groomed into this culture and are quite hardened by the time they reach 16 and locking them up for possessing knives etc, only really serves to educate them further in the crime school that is jail so they are more skilled on their release. I can understand our basic wish of punishment/revenge but as most of these crimes are not actual (carrying not using) such sentences are inevitable short and couter productive if the aim is to cut down on reoffending when they are released.
Seems to me like we need to double down on outreach and schools liaison, to aim to reach these kids and give them positive alternatives to gang culture. Really difficult as many of their musical and pop cultural heroes glamorise the culture and make it mre appealing. It's a huge escalation in the last 10 years of me working with youmg people in East London - I've seen how it works from the inside, the lack of family support, how gangs radicalise the kids as young as 6 and 7 to fill the absent parent gap, and how the culture reinforces itself - its a huge fight ahead to help these kids (the elder ones end up pretty lost to us by mid/late ****s and are destined for lives in and out of jail anyway.
Things like this are quite inspiring and at least seek to get to the source of the problem:
https://www.thekidsnetwork.org.uk/?gad_source=1