Idris Elba leads marketing campaign calling for crackdown on zombie knives

Idris Elba has launched a marketing campaign calling for the instant banning of machetes and so-called zombie knives following a spate of stabbings throughout Britain. 

The Luther star can also be lobbying for extra funding in youth providers and releasing a track in an effort to deal with critical youth violence throughout the UK. 

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme this morning, Elba warned that the nation is at a ‘boiling level’ over the rise in knife crime.

Elba will launch the marketing campaign referred to as Don’t Stop Your Future with an set up in Parliament Square, London, later as we speak. 

It comes amid a sequence of horrific stabbings throughout the UK together with 16-year-old schoolboy Harry Pitman who was knifed to dying as he stood and waited to observe the Primrose Hill New Year’s Eve fireworks in Camden final week. 

The homicide, which came about simply minutes earlier than midnight, made him no less than the seventeenth teenager brutally killed within the capital in 2023 – most of these cruelly taken away from their family members within the final 12 months had additionally been stabbed.

Speaking in regards to the marketing campaign, Elba stated: ‘I am unable to keep silent as extra younger lives are misplaced to those brutal and heartless crimes. 

‘As faculty returns, too many younger individuals is not going to be becoming a member of their classmates and too many grieving households have misplaced a teen they love in recent times. 

‘Young persons are our future, their potential deserves to be met, not taken away by violence. 

‘Parliament has repeatedly not given this concern the main target it deserves, and our political leaders have to prioritise it now. 

‘As nicely as a direct ban on zombie knives and machetes, we have to give younger individuals extra of a cause to not carry a weapon within the first place. 

‘That means investing within the providers that handle the basis causes of violent crime.’ 

The marketing campaign will fill Parliament Square with neatly folded outfits, with every bundle representing somebody who has died by means of knife crime on UK streets. 

The show intends to be a respectful tribute to the lives misplaced, whereas additionally shining a highlight on the dimensions of the problem. 

Elba can also be releasing a track referred to as Knives Down, which goals to present a voice to these most impacted by knife crime and to make use of the facility of music to lift consciousness. 

Don’t Stop Your Future has produced a sequence of billboards highlighting the danger throughout the nation, together with in London, Leeds, Manchester and Sheffield. 

Alongside the instant ban and deal with youth providers, Elba is asking for the Government to convene a coalition to finish knife crime: a cross-party, cross-governmental working group that brings collectively stakeholders who’ve a task to play in tackling knife crime. 

Patrick Green, chief government of anti-knife crime charity the Ben Kinsella Trust, stated: ‘Idris’s Don’t Stop Your Future marketing campaign is an important and far wanted intervention to shine a highlight on critical youth violence, which has been uncared for for too lengthy. 

‘It’s horrifying that hardly a day goes by with out the tragic information of somebody being damage, maimed, and even killed with a machete or zombie knife.’ 

In August 2023, the Home Office introduced more durable measures on machetes and zombie-style knives could be launched. 

Machetes and knives designed to look intimidating and threatening could be made unlawful, whereas the utmost penalty for the importation, manufacturing, possession and sale of those weapons could be elevated to 2 years. 

But progress on passing the brand new laws by means of Parliament has been gradual and a number of other high-profile incidents have occurred since, together with teenager Harry, who ‘didn’t have a nasty bone in his physique’, his household stated.

The Metropolitan Police confirmed a 16-year-old boy had been arrested on suspicion of homicide. He has since been launched on bail.

Harry’s grandfather, Phillip Woolveridge, fears the 6ft 3ins ‘cheeky chappy’ might have been focused due to his peak. 

Earlier final 12 months, Taye Faik, 16, was stabbed to dying simply yards from his residence in a quiet cul-de-sac in Edmonton, north London on October 1.

A 16-year-old woman final week turned the third suspect to be charged along with his homicide.

The teenager, whose identify is withheld due to her age, was first arrested on November 3 and was bailed whereas additional enquiries have been performed.

Two different suspects, Josiah James Semper, 18, and Bernard Carroll, 20, have been charged and are each remanded in custody and are scheduled to look earlier than the court docket on February 16. 

Elianne Andam, 15, was stabbed to dying on her method to faculty in Croydon, south London, in September with what was believed to be a big zombie knife. 

A 17-year-old boy is accused of murdering her, and has been charged with homicide and possession of a bladed weapon in a public place. 

His plea and trial preparation listening to has been set for February 9 whereas a provisional trial date has been set for April 29.

And on Thursday, Mayawati Bracken, 56, often known as Maya, was discovered fatally stabbed inside a luxurious automotive within the sleepy rural village of Pangbourne, Berkshire. 

Thames Valley Police have been referred to as to a highway site visitors collision involving a Lexus car on the A340 Tidmarsh Road after they discovered Maya contained in the automotive with a stab wound. She obtained medical consideration however died on the scene.

Around half an hour later at 6.15pm, officers have been referred to as to a casualty on the railway monitor close to Pangbourne station the place an 18-year-old man, who has not but been named, died of his accidents after being struck by a practice.

Police say the 2 incidents have been ‘linked’ and are investigating the circumstances behind the 2 deaths.