Knife Crime in Scotland: Jail for All Offenders?

The Scottish Police Federation has suggested that a “more sophisticated approach” is required to deal with knife crime in Scotland. It claims that while the threat of jail for those carrying knives on streets may be a useful one in that context, the fact that the majority of knife crime appears to be committed in the home renders this punishment largely ineffective.

The General Secretary of the Scottish Police Federation, Calum Steele noted that "[a] mandatory sentence for carrying a knife is not going to solve the problem of people that are being murdered in their own homes...There are many murders that take place in domestic premises in Scotland where police officers don't have the ability to influence patterns of behaviour. Any banning of knives or mandatory sentences for people carrying knives in public will not tackle that particular problem."

In order to implement the blanket jail sentence policy, it has been suggested that around £20 million would need to be spent. It remains to be seen what, if any, steps the Scottish government will take as an alternative and whether it will have any bearing on sentencing in the Scottish courts.