More on Fear and Fashion
Achievements
The four projects funded under the Fear and Fashion initiative could never solve the problem of knife crime, or even demonstrate how to solve the problem. However a number of important lessons have already emerged. The programme seeks to establish good practice, identify contributory success factors and share the learning with others. Set out below are some of the interim lessons learnt on work to prevent the carrying and using of knives.
- Awareness-raising with young people, including those young people most at risk of crime, of the dangers to themselves and others of using and carrying knives along with prevention work is important, especially in schools.
- 'Shock and awe' deterrence is of limited value and can be counter-productive. Showing young people photographs of bloody wounds caused by stabbing may well shock and deter those who do not carry or use knives. However the same pictures may reinforce that, causing a serious injury through stabbing is all too easy in the minds of young people already considering committing a crime involving a knife.
- Young people in general are interested and concerned about the extent of carrying knives and knife-enabled crime and keen to know more about it.
- Some young people carry knives with no intention of using them and fail to recognise the danger that their own knife could be used against themselves or others.
- Young people can be engaged in prevention initiatives through more generic community-based youth work and activities for young people, including arts-based activities such as music and deejaying, as well as work in schools.
- However, it is harder to directly engage the young people at risk of becoming involved in knife-enabled crime. These are often young people on the fringes of gang activity and associated with young people who use knives as part of committing other crimes, such as mobile phone theft. The risk factors for knife crime seem to be similar to those for other youth crime, including poor school attendance. The demonstration projects have developed their work in Pupil Referral Units to reach the group of young people at risk.
- Feedback from all the projects suggests that parents in general and particularly parents in areas where there has been fatal stabbing are extremely concerned about knife crime. Parents whose children have been murdered by stabbing tend briefly to become high profile figures in the media, but there is a yawning gap in advice for parents, both those parents who are concerned that their children might be carrying or using knives and those parents whose children have been prosecuted and are now part of the Criminal Justice System. There is a risk that information available to parents is scare-mongering and misleading, giving rise to unnecessary anxiety. Some parents seek to deny their child's role in knife crime or their own responsibility for ensuring their child is safe. General advice is available on Government-sponsored websites, however more specific one-to-one advice is needed for parents to recognise, own and discuss the problem with their children before, rather than after, a tragedy occurs.
- Many knife-related incidents blow up out of other tensions and conflicts and there is still too little capacity for mediation and conflict resolution in schools and communities to nip these tensions in the bud, before they escalate into territorial or armed conflicts.
- One-to-one work with young offenders dealing explicitly with the carrying and using of knives and other weapons can be effective. There is a shortage of capacity within YOTs for undertaking this deterrent work.
- In the long term the alternatives to knife crime are higher aspirations and positive peer influences to reduce and destroy the appeal of transgressive violent sub-cultures and get-rich-quick illegal ways of earning money, such as drug dealing.
More on the initiative's achievements from our partner, City Bridge Trust.
Evaluation
Clear Plan was commissioned to undertake an independent evaluation. This report is now available to download:
Fear and Fashion Summary.pdf
Fear and Fashion Full evaluation report.pdf
Publications
Evaluation report available to download:
Fear and Fashion Summary.pdf
Fear and Fashion Full evaluation report.pdf
Advisory Group
The Advisory Group has now completed its role. Its members included:
Roy Amlot Q.C. (Chair)
Gerard Lemos, Lemos and Crane
Angela Sarkis CBE, YMCA
Rob Allen, Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, King's College
Albert Tucker, City Parochial Foundation
Paul Cavadino, NACRO
Dinah Cox, Race on the Agenda
Professor Tim Newburn, London School of Economics
Shami Chakrabarti, Liberty
Mike Taylor, Head of Serious & Organised Crime Prevention, Metropolitan Police
Toby Streeter, Head of Strategic Prevention, Metropolitan Police
Simon Strick, Head of Research & Development, Metropolitan Police
Trust for London staff: Sioned Churchill