There has been a 42 percent increase in children caught in possession of a weapon in the last 2 academic years, according to figures obtained.
Most alarmingly, South Yorkshire saw a 151 percent rise in the number of youngsters caught with knives in school during the last 2 academic years.
And in Greater Manchester the figure increased by 90 percent, West Midlands 30 percent and London 20 percent.
The number of incidents involving machetes has risen by more than 60 percent over the last three years in England and Wales – that is according to Freedom of Information request responses to the BBC from just over half of police forces.
In Lancashire figures for the last two years reveal there were 18 permanent exclusions of pupils and 58 fixed period exclusions due to weapons in schools.
Lancashire County Council however, have no figures relating to incidents of children reported to be in possession of a knife or other bladed or pointed weapon on school premises. The council admitted to the Blackpool Gazette that it did not hold this information.
This seems to be a widespread trend that recording knife crimes in schools are not done as the overwhelming majority of the 213 local education authorities contacted by the Gazette either failed to respond or said they did not hold the data.
When asked by the researchers for their data on knife confiscations or offences under Freedom of Information rules, 72 per cent of British local education authorities who responded said they did not hold any such data or were unable to retrieve it.
In total, 2 400 pupils have been caught with a knife or other weapon in school since 2012 and police have had reports of more than 3 500 knife-related crimes on school grounds during that time.
The knife crime epidemic has spread across the country. Children are being caught in school armed with knives and other lethal weapons on average once a day in the UK.
A spokesman for the Department for Education said: “This Government has taken decisive action to put teachers back in charge of discipline in the classroom by strengthening their powers to take action if they suspect a pupil has brought prohibited items, including knives, into school.
“It is of paramount importance that schools provide a safe environment for their pupils, and any incident that does occur is completely unacceptable.
“Knife crime has devastating consequences and this Government is determined to tackle this and do all it can to break the deadly cycle and protect our children, families and communities.”
But not all police forces record knife offences according to the type of location where they occur and few local authorities collect information on knife incidents in schools despite still being responsible for the vast majority of primary schools and 30 per cent of secondary schools.
Earlier this year London overtook New York City as one of the most dangerous capital cities. The House of Commons recently revealed the UK capital has more acid attacks per capita than any other city in the world.
Before Sadiq Khan became mayor of London, the crime figures had fallen significantly – the Conservative Party brought down murders to between 10 and 15 deaths of young people per year from over 30.
Surprisingly, Khan faces almost no pressure over this alarming increase from his constituents. Instead he wants to address rising violence and unrest in the UK capital with a campaign of censorship, calling on YouTube to take down videos about gang violence and knife crime while London is in the midst of a violent crime wave.
Knife crimes rose by 24 percent in 2017 in London, and crime is up in almost every other category as well, according to figures released by the Metropolitan police.
“Social media and the Internet can be used to inflame tensions and escalate violence quicker than ever before, and these videos are a shocking example of the glamorization of gang culture,” Khan warned.
Social media platforms must toughen their guidelines & remove violent videos that encourage crime. pic.twitter.com/MZkwcVpW3q
— Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) August 9, 2017
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe said gangs were no longer the culprits. “By and large, it used to be gang members, but that’s not the case now,” he said.
“We’ve seen an increase in the number of other young people carrying knives, young people with no links to gangs. So at the moment, some 75 percent – three quarters – of all knife injuries among the under-25s are not gang-related. The 25 percent that are – this is around 450 offenses in the last year, so about one a day – tend to be more serious, and gang members remain the most dangerous knife carriers, but the changing trend is clearly a concern.
“The reasons, so far as we can determine by talking to suspects, are self-protection, status, protecting criminal interests – such as a drugs business – and a culture of fear. This can be a self-fulfilling prophecy, where young people equip themselves with a knife and in doing so significantly up the ante of their chances of becoming a knife victim,” Hogan-Howe concluded.
South Wales’ Police Commissioner has meanwhile called for action due to spiralling crime. South Wales Police reported a staggering 257 percent rise in rape and serious sexual offences, from 727 offences in 2011-12 to a projected 2 593 in 2017-18.
Commissioner Alun Michael noted the rise in crime figures released by the Office of National Statistics, showing violent crimes have gone up by 20 percent in England and Wales in just one year.