Knife slayings hit their highest total since records began in 1946 in the year to March 2022, according to official statistics.
The Office for Nation Statistics (ONS) figures, which cover England and Wales but not Scotland and Northern Ireland, which have their own information-gathering bodies, put the number of homicides “committed using a knife or sharp instrument” in the two Home Nations at 282, an increase of almost a fifth (19 per cent) on the previous year and the highest annual total since the Home Office began keeping a Homicide Index in 1946.
The previous record of 281 had been set relatively recently in the year to March 2018 — at a time when there were no coronavirus lockdowns or restrictions on gatherings and travel, as there were across large sections of the year to March 2022.
In terms of demographics, youths and young men aged 16 to 24 were the most common victims of deadly knife violence, accounting for 122 deaths — but deaths in the 45 to 54-year-old age group were not far behind at 119 after a 53 per cent spike compared to the previous year.
Victims aged 55 to 64 spiked by an even sharper 54 per cent, though actual deaths were lower overall at 77, and victims in the 65 and over category were also up significantly to their highest in at least a decade.
White people were the most common victims in terms of ethnicity, accounting for 496 deaths, or 71 per cent of the total — an increase of 110 compared to the year to March 2021 and an increase of 71 compared to the year to March 2020, before lockdowns and related coronavirus measures had had time to force significant changes on the society’s regular running.
Black people, meanwhile, accounted for 91 death, or 13 per cent of the total — lower overall but, in terms of their share of the population, about four times higher than the knife homicide rate for other groups.
Curiously, all non-black ethnic minorities in Britain were lumped together under ‘Other’ in the ONS’s main release, despite South Asians, for example, having long accounted for a significantly larger share of the migration-background population than black people.
This ‘Other’ category suffered 84 knife homicides, up from 63 the previous year.
Men were far more likely than women to be victims, accounting for 72 per cent of deaths, and were also far more likely to be perpetrators, accounting for 91 per cent of suspects in cases where someone was charged for a male’s killing and 95 per cent of suspects in cases where someone was charged for a female’s killing.
“We need to see more action in schools and more stop and search,” said Marco Longhi, a Member of Parliament (MP) for Britain’s governing Conservative (Tory) Party, in comments to The Sun.
“The latter can be controversial but I think it’s the kindest thing to do if it saves lives,” he said, in reference to the fact that police searches are often criticised by woke activists for allegedly targeting ethnic minorities, particularly black people, disproportionately.
“The Government is badly failing to take strong enough action to stop knife crime especially among young people,” added Yvette Cooper, a Labour MP who as Shadow Home Secretary is expected to take over from the Conservatives’ Suella Braverman as the minister with broad responsibility for law and order if her party wins the next general election, as it is currently on track to do.
However, much of the violent crime in England takes place in areas where Labour already controls the local government, particularly London, where Mayor Sadiq Khan — who went into office vowing to “do everything” to drastically reduce stop and search — also acts as Police and Crime Commissioner.
In terms of drivers of knife crime, The Sun highlighted the increasing weakness of the British judiciary, which despite a number of half-measures to toughen sentences introduced by the Conservatives and even the former Labour government is actually sending criminals convicted of knife offences to prison in the lowest numbers for a decade.
Breitbart London has also seen statistics released under the Freedom of Information Act suggesting mass migration may be a factor in helping to drive knife crime, with the Metropolitan Police alone detaining hundreds of foreign nationals for possessing knives and similar implements last year.