By James Simons-
Actor and campaigner, Idris Elba has argued against mandatory prison sentences for carrying a knife amid a deepening public discussion over how to tackle an epidemic of street violence.
His call comes as the government announced plans to close “a legal loophole” to ban the sale of zombie knives.
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The actor and campaigner said there was no “one size fits all” that would banish weapons, and cautioned against criminalising young men caught up in a cycle of violence.
His comments come the day after the family of the Nottingham stabbing victim Grace O’Malley-Kumar called for compulsory prison sentences if caught carrying a knife.
The Home Office will be putting forward secondary legislation on Thursday to tighten the ban on zombie-style knives in England and Wales, which was first introduced in 2016.
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Previous attempts to ban the weapons defined them as having a cutting or serrated edge and “images or words that suggest that it is to be used for the purpose of violence”.
The new law, which will not come into effect until September, will also ban “zombie” knives with no threatening words or images, the Home Office said.
Elba, who has long campaigned on the issue, met Home Office ministers on Wednesday to discuss the changes.
Speaking to BBC Breakfast, he said many young people carried knives because they were scared, because they had been stabbed themselves, or had seen someone else stabbed. “He’s walking through a neighbourhood, and thinks: I’m going to protect myself here – he ends up in jail for five years. You wonder, are we winning?” he said.
He added that a deterrent to make young people know that they would pay a penalty if they carried a knife was an important step, but that there were “gradients” to the issue.
“As a deterrent it’s a really important step to consider, but it’s not one size fits all,” he said.
On Wednesday, Sinead O’Malley, a consultant anaesthetist, said carrying a knife was “no different” to carrying a gun. “I believe there has to be mandatory prison sentences for carrying a knife. It is not just an offensive weapon or something you could eat your food with. It is a lethal weapon.”
In the same interview, her husband, Dr Sanjoy Kumar, a GP, described knife crime in England as an “epidemic” and said existing legislation on the issue appeared “easy going”.
The court heard earlier this week that Grace O’Malley-Kumar, 19, showed “incredible bravery” trying to defend Barnaby Webber from Valdo Calocane before being fatally stabbed.
Amendments to the criminal justice bill will raise the maximum sentence for the possession of banned weapons from six months to two years. They will also give police the power to seize and destroy knives found in homes, if there are reasonable grounds to suspect they will be used for serious crime.
Labour said the government’s proposed changes had already been promised by six Conservative home secretaries and that closing “loopholes” was not going far enough.
The party plans to launch a programme of action plans for young people caught with a knife, which could result in them being subject to curfews, tagging or behavioural contracts. Labour first made this announcement at their conference in the autumn.
Keir Starmer vowed this week to ban ninja swords if Labour won the next election.
The party also said it would launch a £100m Sure Start-style programme to tackle knife crime. Labour’s programme, called Young Futures, would require coordination of local services to identify those most at risk of falling into knife crime.
Chris Philp, the policing minister, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that while some swords would be caught by the latest legislation, “there are a number issues like historical swords”.
He said: “The use of a sword, because they’re very hard to conceal … is very, very rare. If we find, in the future, having done this even further tightening, that there are other things that need to be brought into the scope, then we can do another statutory instrument like we’re doing today to ban those.”
Elba put pressure on the government when he launched the Don’t Stop Your Future campaign to tackle youth violence earlier this month. As well as a ban on zombie knives and machetes, the campaign is calling for more funding for youth services.
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