NHS must help tackle violent crime in Islington (Islington Liberal Democrats)

Islington Liberal Democrats <Islington_ld@cix.co.uk>

NHS must help tackle violent crime in Islington

April 16, 2009 4:31 PM

Local Lib Dem campaigner Bridget Fox meets with Shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne. Liberal Democrats are calling for hospitals across the country to help in the fight against violent crime.

Liberal Democrats in Islington are calling on local hospitals to help tackle knife crime by taking part in a new scheme that could drastically cut the number of violent crimes in the borough that go undetected by police. The Liberal Democrats have said that hospital accident and emergency units and the police must to work together to identify crime blackspots.

Large numbers of violent offences which result in emergency hospital treatment are not detected by the police. Even very serious violence, such as knife and gun crime, may not be reported to the police, for example in cases involving drug-related or gang crime.

Hospitals should contribute effectively and distinctively to preventing violence in the community by forging a close working relationship with the local authority and the police to share data about violent incidents that result in hospitalisation.

The hospital should record, for every victim of violence, on what street, in what licensed premises or other location, with what weapon, and how many assailants there were. This data should be anonymised or pseudonymised, in line with existing medical practices, and shared with the local police, to significantly enhance the effectiveness of targeted policing.

According to research by the Liberal Democrats, neither of the local casualty units - the Whittington or University College Hospital - systematically collect the information that would be useful to the police.

In Cardiff where information is routinely passed on to the police about locations where injuries caused by knife crime take place to back up their call for hospitals and police to work together. As a result, police in Cardiff have been able to target the areas with the worst knife crime rates, and this has contributed to a 40% reduction in incidents.

Islington's Lib Dem Community Safety chief Terry Stacy said:

"There is very clear evidence that the police can be more effective when hospitals help them build up a picture of where violent crime is taking place."

"We're calling on hospitals to pass anonymous data to the police. Unfortunately, Liberal Democrat research has shown that 4 out of 5 hospitals in England are not passing on this vital information, and Islington is among them. In many ways Islington has been a good example of different public bodies coming together to help tackle crime, but the NHS needs to play its part.

"The scheme was started by a public-spirited NHS consultant in Cardiff and has been proven effective. Now the local hospitals need to take it up urgently."

Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne commented:

"Posturing on tougher punishments by Labour and the Tories is irrelevant if you do not catch more criminals. The Government is failing to deliver on a proven method that cuts knife crime by nearly half.

"With 43 young people killed through knife crime last year alone, it beggars belief that the National Health Service is not pulling its weight in tackling the problem.

"If the police are to catch more knife carriers, they need to intensively patrol knife crime hot-spots. They are best identified from anonymous hospital data, which is free from the meddling hand of Whitehall.

"Heads at the Department of Health and the Home Office must be knocked together to ensure that the Cardiff Model is used in every emergency ward in the country."