Get Smart: Don’t carry that knife

8:57am Wednesday 20th August 2008

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There is a very simple way of not helping cut knife crime.

Just get some anonymous adult or police officer to stand in front of a group of bored schoolchildren and tell them not to do it.

The result? The term “going in one ear, and out the other” springs to mind.

Create a fun setting and use talented young people to tell of their experiences of knife crime, bullying and drugs and the results are totally different.

Pam Withrington, likes to call it “info-tainment”.

As co-ordinator of Essex’s award-winning roadshow Too Smart, she knows first-hand how effective good role models are in getting the anti-drugs/knife message across to youngsters.

“By talking to youngsters in their language and helping them understand through dance, drama, sport and music, they can relate to it more,” she explained.

For the past 12 years, the 90-minute Too Smart roadshow has been offered to all year seven pupils – 11-12-year-olds – in every secondary school in Essex.

Every year, 15,000 youngsters get the chance to learn valuble lessons about not getting into crime through Too Smart.

It may be done in a fun way, but the bottom line is serious – deadly serious.

“It is all about having respect,” explained Mrs Withrington.

“With real life messages coming from young people, then the children are more likely to relate to them, want to listen to their story and are more prepared to take on their message.”

Role models can also play a valuable part in the battle against knife crime.

Ahead of tonight’s match with the Czech Republic, England footballer David Beckham revealed how a vicious knife attack shook his childhood.

Beckham was joined by team-mates Rio Ferdinand and David James to pledge to use their influence to save other youngsters from a bloody fate.

Fighting against the might of peer pressure is no mean feat.

Getting youngsters to think more about the consequences of following others, though, and the results can be positive.

“It is about giving young people the right information so they can make the right decisions for themselves,” she added.

This proactive approach is at the heart of Essex Police’s campaign in the war on knife crime.

Compared to other parts of the country, Essex has a very low knife crime problem.

The county’s force wants to keep it that way and through intiatives such as the Too Smart roadshows, it wants to nip any potential increase firmly in the bud.

But like all crime, the fear of it is worse than it actually happening.

Feedback from youngsters at the Too Smart roadshows – which used to mainly concentrate on drugs – meant last year the focus changed to increase awareness about knife crime.

The recent increase in stabbings making the headlines has not gone unnoticed by youngsters, said Insp Kevin Whipps, head of the children and young people’s policing team at Essex Police.

“It all brings home to kids that this is not a safe place to live, but the reality is Essex is one of the safest areas of the country,” he added.

This does not mean the county’s force is complacent about it.

Far from it, stressed Mr Whipps.

Be it peer pressure or kudos, youngsters need to know early on in their lives that carrying a blade is bad news.

It is one thing to carry a knife to “feel safe”, but to get a knife out is crossing a threshold to far more dangerous territiory.

“They are potentially a lethal weapon, and, as a young person, this is not a good place to be,” he added.

Considering 60-70 per cent of those injured with knives are the result of their own knives being turned on them, it is clear carrying a knife is far from a safety measure.

The job for the police is getting the message across to youngsters that going armed with a knife is no way to deal with bullies.

Essex Police is keen for officers to build good relations with the county’s youngsters through its police community support officers visiting schools and its 25 school-based officers.

Mr Whipps said the fact the figure was comparatively higher than other areas shows how proactive the force wants to be about building good relations with youngsters.

“We want to create a telling culture so the youngsters can tell us how it is.

“They won’t tell us anything if we haven’t built up a relationship with them first,” he stressed.

Likewise, the message needs to get to them that the Government means business when it comes to tackling knife crime.

Gone are the days when a first offence may just end with a slap on the wrists.

Under new guidelines, any 16 to 17-year-old found carrying a knife – regardless of it being a first offence, or not – will be charged.

And few youngsters want to start adult life with an offensive weapon charge on their records.

CRACKDOWN ON KNIFECRIME

THE Government launched a £3 million blitz on knife-crime in June.

Since then almost 750 people have been stopped and searched every day.

Officers stopped 55,000 people, arrested 2,500 suspects and seized 1,600 knives during operations in ten violent hotspots in England and Wales.

In Essex from April to July 2008, there were 406 knife-crime offences, ranging from possession of blades to knifepoint robberies.