London: The UK government has announced that more than 1,000 weapons have been surrendered under a month-long national knife amnesty campaign, launched to combat rising knife crime.
The initiative coincides with the official enforcement of a new ban on ninja swords, as part of the government’s wider crackdown on dangerous weapons.
The campaign was intensified following a deadly knife attack on July 29, 2024, when teenager Axel Rudakubana attacked a Taylor Swift-themed children’s dance event in Southport, northern England. The horrifying incident left three girls dead and 10 others wounded in what has become one of Britain’s most disturbing mass stabbings.
When I was Director of Public Prosecutions, I saw first-hand how knife crime devastates families.
My Plan for Change is turning the tide:
Knife robberies down in the hardest-hit areas.
Over 1,000 weapons taken off our streets in July.
And from today, ninja swords are banned.
— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) August 1, 2025
According to the interior ministry, knife crime in England and Wales has surged by 87 percent over the past decade, with 54,587 knife offences recorded in the last year alone, a 2 percent increase from 2023, placing the UK among the highest in Europe in terms of such violence.
In response, the UK government has taken several steps:
- Tightened age verification checks for knife buyers.
- Warned social media platforms of possible fines for failing to prevent the sale and promotion of weapons online.
- Introduced bans on zombie-style knives, machetes, and now ninja swords.
Throughout July 2025, the amnesty allowed individuals, especially youth, to anonymously dispose of knives and weapons in designated ‘amnesty’ bins or through a mobile surrender van.
Over 1,000 weapons were handed in during this period. The same mobile van will be deployed at London’s Notting Hill Carnival later this month, in response to past incidents of knife-related violence during the event.
It remains unclear whether the weapon drop-off bins will remain available following the end of the campaign. The UK interior ministry has yet to respond to media inquiries regarding the permanence of the initiative.
The ban on ninja swords forms part of the government’s effort to enact Ronan’s Law, named after 16-year-old Ronan Kanda, who was fatally stabbed with such a weapon in 2022. Authorities hope the ban will help prevent similar tragedies.
In a notable shift, knife-related robberies in the seven highest-risk areas have reportedly declined, from accounting for 14 percent of all robberies in the year ending June 2024, to 6 percent in the year ending June 2025.
While many charities and experts have welcomed the government’s recent actions as a positive step, they argue that the deeper, underlying causes of knife crime, particularly among youth, remain unaddressed.
Campaigner Martin Cosser, whose son was also killed in a knife attack, told that the real issue lies not only in the weapons themselves, but in the emotional and psychological factors that lead individuals to carry them in the first place.
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