The Government is committed to delivering on the people’s priorities by tackling violent crime and giving the police the resources and powers they need to fight crime. In January this year we announced the biggest funding increase in a decade for the police system and we are recruiting an additional 20,000 police officers over next three years including 6,000 additional officers by the end of financial year 2020/21.
In the 18 Police Force areas worst affected by serious violence, we have invested a total of £176.5 million over 2 years (2019-21) to deliver a whole-systems response. Of this funding £106.5 million is to enhance the Police’s operational response and £70 million has funded the establishment of local, multi-agency Violence Reduction Units to address the drivers of serious violence. Tackling serious violence will be backed with £119 million in 2020-21, which includes £20 million to tackle county lines drug dealing.
The Government has also invested £200 million in a 10-year Youth Endowment (YEF) Fund to tackle serious youth violence and an extra £5million has been awarded to the YEF in 2020 to develop a National Centre of Excellence, which will share knowledge and expertise with those working with vulnerable children and young people at risk of involvement in serious youth violence.
It was announced on 19 December in the Queen’s Speech that we will be bringing forward legislation that will place new duties on a range of specified agencies across different sectors to work collaboratively, share data and information, and put in place plans to prevent and reduce serious violence.
In addition, on 14 September we launched an 8-week public consultation on the design of the new court order - Serious Violence Reduction Orders (SVROs). SVROs would give the police personalised powers to target those already convicted of certain knife and weapon offences, giving them the automatic right to search those who pose the greatest risk.
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