I don't think you should put all the blame on Glaswegians.

Oddly enough, I suspect that politicians in Glasgow were not unduly bothered, one way or the other, about a load of Neds deciding to brutally chop each other in a variety of unpleasant ways much beyond what the costs might have been in terms of the subsequent Police investigations.

And there in lays the reality that the political elites found it much easier to step aside and let a multi-agency approach have a chance at solving the problem because none of them stood to lose or gain much from a solution being found.

Where as here in London, its all political. With perhaps the biggest irony of all being that a Tory Mayor might find themselves with far fewer downsides to actually ordering the sort of steps that need to be taken to deal with horror story unfolding on the streets.

Also, and I am sure there is a clever formula out there that could be applied, the real miracle is that the amount of deaths is not even higher. Given the advances in trauma medicine over the last 20 years, even the horrendous figures of deaths we are seeing does not truly represent the wider picture of knife crime in the capital.

Edited by Matov (20 Feb 2018 5.06pm)

Edited by Matov (20 Feb 2018 5.07pm)

"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command." - 1984 - George Orwell.

Lack of KFC chicken. Told ya.

COYP

I'd say lack of father figures and births of children from mothers that would be better off not giving birth yet or at all are more of a factor. It begins in the home. Plenty of children with good guidance in the home don't put a foot wrong.

The old nothing to do argument. While that may apply to teenagers up to a certain age, once they get to a certain age they're not into hanging out with younger kids. Kids have always been bored. They haven't always been prepared to stabbed each other.

The police are under resourced though.

COYP

A little perspective.

15-24 year olds represent about 10% of the population of London, so 880k. That roughly works out at odds of 110,000/1 of being stabbed to death.

Why would anyone move out of London because of odds like that?

Especially as road accidents are a significantly bigger killer of this age group. And fatal accidents are more likely to happen outside of cities.

So, anyone moving out of London to the country for the safety of their children are actually putting their children in greater risk.

What can we do?

I'm in favor of arresting and sentencing those carrying knives on the street. But nothing stops someone grabbing a knife at home and stabbing someone shortly after.