Zombie knives: a small move in the right direction, by Oxford West and Abingdon MP Nicola Blackwood

OUR community knows all too well the devastating impact of knife crime. Last December, Gulsen Alkan’s husband Justin Skrebowski was killed in Poundland in Abingdon. His attacker simply picked up a kitchen knife from the shelf. Ever since I have been working with Gulsen campaigning for knives to be stored more securely in stores, and the Government has thrown its weight behind an agreement with major retail companies, including Poundland, to sell knives more safely.

Gulsen called it a ‘random, meaningless and mindless’ attack. We can stop more attacks like this if we take a common sense approach to the sale and display of knives in store and online. So far this year over 2,000 weapons have been taken from our streets as police work around the clock to tackle knife crime, and while we can take encouragement from falling overall crime levels it is true that knife-related crimes have increased compared to 12 months ago.

Where knives are easily available, retailers have a responsibility to prevent attacks. That is why the recent ban on zombie knives is so essential. The knives have names like ‘head splitter’ and ‘death dagger’, they can be up to two feet long and with serrated edges and can be purchased online for as little as £8. Most people I have spoken with are shocked that zombie knives were so accessible in the first place.

I took Gulsen’s campaign straight to Home Office Ministers and to a conference at Scotland Yard to show just how easy it was for such a senseless attack to be carried out. It quickly became clear that the sale of weapons on the dark web has contributed to the increase in knife crime and something had to be done. While major retailers like Amazon rightly stopped selling zombie knives, there are smaller outlets that have continued to sell weapons online and even to under 18s. I simply cannot see how this can ever have been acceptable; zombie knives have no practical use at all and clearly no place on our streets. This is why the Government has now amended the Criminal Justice Act, banning the sale, manufacture, rental, or importation of the weapons, and anyone caught will face a prison sentence.

Clearly there is more to be done particularly to end the glamorization of violence online: one website even advertised the knives calling on customers to ‘grab’ them ‘while you can’ before the ban came in. There are many innovative projects being driven forward at local and national level by police forces, charities and practitioners designed to turn people away from knife crime. It will take more education and coordinated law enforcement, as well as addressing the often complex social issues involved, to truly get knives off our streets for good, but the safe sale of knives in stores and the ban on zombie knives are key steps forward.