“This is to Alex, the newspaper is only doing its job that it is in business for, ie.reporting the news, and if the news appears to be sensationalist (so what?) but "sensationalist" does NOT make it UNTRUE! And if the figures for knife crime were not reported, then I would be ignorant of that information because I reply on my newspaper to do just that - report the news!”

“Carrying a knife gives a kid street cred. Receiving a police warning or a caution gives added street cred along with their treasured ASBO. Doesn't anyone understand the mentality of these kids?”

“Maybe if the powers that be were tougher and actually imposed the laws on knife crime that they set and created a fear of imprisonment in the knife carriers then maybe i wouldn't have to wear body armour to work.”

“- its not too much paperwork for the police at all !- Its called practical policing, is it really in the public interest to take a youth to court on his/her first offence if they show remorse or admit the offence at the earliest opportunity ? The cost involved in the simplest of cases in court is a huge amount of public money. A police reprimand or final warning is a conviction so why tie up the court systems YOU have to take each and every incident on its own merit, situations involving LAW cannot be generalized. Its not applicable in some cases to reprimand/warn but the decision to take a case to court would generally be made by the Crown Prosecution service in many cases - NOT THE POLICE.”

“Being sensible about it, one can recognise it must sometimes be a better thing to put a kid back on the straight and narrow with a warning as opposed to putting them through the criminal justice system. The issue is perhaps one of confidence in the police to issue warnings only when appropriate. Maybe we suspect that the police can't be bothered to tackle low level offending, which we then see as leading to greater problems. It could be that our confidence is a little shaky and we see zero tolerance as the only way to enforce a more orderly society ¿ by forcing the hand of those who police our streets.

But isn't it true that we'd rather have policemen and women who employed common sense when it came to offending? When, if an offence isn't too serious, we're happy to rely on their discretion to determine the best way to handle it to stop repeat offending?

A perceived lack of police on our streets, visible social breakdown, ludicrously light punishments and poor response to non-targeted categories of crime all contribute to a public perception that our 'service' isn't serving us too well. We may want our police to employ common sense when it comes to offending, but we also know that target driven policing distorts policing priorities away from those the public wants in favour of those short term fixes the politicians want. We suspect that because their priorities have been diverted elsewhere, an officer isn't necessarily going to take the right decision for the right reasons, and would perhaps rather get back on 'target'. And you know the sad thing? I think that perception is correct.”

“Ah ha!!! More sensationalist news from the Newspaper group that brings you The Daily (hate) Mail!!”

“Knife Crime is a serious problem and has not to be taken lightly.”

“Knife crime? Well, only the other day I caught a youth trying to eat some fish with a cheese knife!!
What is the world coming to? Tell me!”

“Please bear in mind that not all people who carry knives are thugs who are intent to use them violently. My Grandma always carries a knife with her to peel and core the fruit that she keeps in her bag as a snack when out. I'm not saying that we have anepidemic of youthful fruit peelers but there may be legitimate or plausible explainations that were given to police - Hence the let-offs”

“Why aren't they paying for their knives like everyone else has to?

And, why are youths being caught with knives when a net or lassoo would do the job without all the resulting mess to clean up?”