Police figures show there has been a spike in the use of firearms and knife attacks within the last few months, with the latest data in January showing the highest number of victims since records started, says Darroch Ball co-leader of Sensible Sentencing Trust.

“The latest stabbing in Westmere has added to the skyrocketing number of victims of ‘acts intended to cause injury’ involving knives or firearms.”

“In January alone there was a total of 139 victims at the end of an attack involving a knife or a firearm, which is an exponential increase since April last year recording just 70 similar attacks."

“Knife attack victims have increased by almost 15% since 2019, with 113 victims of attacks in January this year alone. There was an almost 18% increase in ‘acts intended to cause injury’ involving firearms over the same period.”

“These Police figures show the increase in brazen violence offenders are now showing during attacks with the use of deadly weapons.”

“The public is seeing an increase in these types of violent attacks and our communities are becoming increasingly dangerous and unsafe.”

“The government seems to be caught in the headlights and stuck in neutral with no real action against this increase in violence.”

“With gang numbers and tensions escalating, coupled with a massive spike in victims of these attacks, unbelievably the government continues to freeze funding for police recruitment numbers.”

“Funding needs to be brought forward immediately to fund Police recruitment to train more of the promised, and desperately needed frontline officers.”

“If the government continues to do nothing these attacks will continue to increase, and our communities will continue to become more and more unsafe.”

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