Use stop and search in schools to tackle knife crime, MP suggests

Stop and search could be used in schools as a way to help clamp down on knife crime, the chair of the education select committee has suggested.

The Conservative MP Robert Halfon was speaking ahead of a committee hearing that has been called to look at whether there is a link between the rise in school exclusions and an increase in the number of stabbings.

Halfon said he accepted there were different views on stop and search, but he wanted to hear evidence from experts on whether it could play a role in the fight against knife crime.

“I think possibly in schools where there’s trouble you probably need to do it,” he said. “I want to hear the evidence.”

Witnesses due to appear before the committee include Mark Simmons, an assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan police, and Sir Michael Wilshaw, a former head of Ofsted who is a professor of education and director of multi-academy trusts at St Mary’s University, Twickenham.

Halfon acknowledged police resources were limited, but suggested more could be invested in establishing special constables as role models in schools, working to prevent vulnerable pupils from being excluded and becoming involved with gangs.

The Harlow MP said he would like to see more learning support units run by trained staff in schools so pupils who might otherwise be excluded remained on the premises.

Where pupils had to be excluded, there should be high-quality alternative provision, he said.

There were 41 fatal stabbings in England and Wales in the first two months of this year, and many of the victims were teenagers.

The former Met commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe and London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, are among those who have linked the rise in pupil exclusions to gang and knife crime.

However, the education secretary, Damian Hinds, has warned against making “a simple causal link” between the two.

“According to a 2018 Ministry of Justice study, four-fifths of those who were found to be carrying a knife before the end of secondary school had never been permanently excluded from school,” he wrote in the Times.

But Halfon said the question of whether exclusion was a cause of knife crime was immaterial. “There’s a correlation between people who join gangs and people who are excluded, and people who carry knives and people who are excluded. Let’s get away from this causation argument and let’s deal with it,” he said.

According to official figures, there were 7,700 permanent pupil exclusions in 2016-17, the equivalent of more than 40 a day during the school year, up from a little over 35 a day the previous year. Halfon said permanent exclusions had risen by 56% since 2013-14; children with special educational needs account for about half of all permanent and temporary exclusions.

Halfon acknowledged exclusions were sometimes necessary – including when pupils were found carrying knives – and defended the autonomy of headteachers to make those decisions. “The problem is they are excluded and where do they go? If they are excluded are they going to end up on the streets and joining gangs?” he asked.