PCC secures almost £1m to support ongoing work to prevent serious violence

Credit: Better Times for the Derbyshire PCC

Tens of thousands of children and young people across Derbyshire and Derby City will continue to benefit from targeted educational activities, mentoring and interactive workshops to prevent their involvement in serious violence.

Derbyshire Police and Crime Commissioner Nicolle Ndiweni-Roberts has secured an additional £941,000 in Home Office funding to support the continuation of existing violence reduction services and initiatives.

The investment has been awarded as part of the Government’s Serious Violence Duty and supports collaborative work already underway to tackle serious violence.

The multi-agency Derby and Derbyshire Serious Violence Board, which works with the PCC to tackle some of the most serious types of harm including knife crime, possession of weapons and serious injuries and deaths caused by acts of violence, has approved grants for several providers across the City and County.

From immersive Virtual Reality (VR) education enabling young people to experience first-hand the harsh consequences of carrying knives through to intensive one-to-one mentoring for young people who have already committed a violent offence or are at high risk of doing so, the interventions target the underlying factors that drive violent behaviour including trauma and Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) before it escalates into tragedy or irreversible offending.

Part of the Home Office’s grant will support the county’s Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) to continue direct interventions to prevent serious violence while other funding will support the ongoing work of the City and County Young Futures Prevention Partnership Panels. These panels consist of youth justice experts, police and voluntary partners and aim to identify and support children and young people aged 10-17 who are at risk of being drawn into youth violence including violence against women and girls (VAWG), knife crime and ASB.

Welcoming the funding, Police and Crime Commissioner Nicolle Ndiweni-Roberts said: “This money will support the work already underway across the county to change lives. Across Derbyshire, parents, families, teachers, youth workers and residents are concerned about serious violence. They want tough action to challenge the glorification of violence and violent culture and its impact on impressionable young minds and to disrupt misguided beliefs that it is a solution to conflict. They also want to know that when children leave for school or college or go out for an evening with friends they will return home safely and will not be exploited or come to harm.

“There are no overnight successes in tackling serious violence. But by sustaining the work already going on in our communities at grassroots level and acting as early as possible when we identify the risks, we will prevent more lives being irrevocably lost and damaged through serious violence. We will also give more young people a better start.

“However, while I welcome this funding to continue delivering the impactful initiatives what we have in place, I am aware that there is more to do so I will continue to lobby the Government for additional support.”

Serious Violence including Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) is the highest of six key priorities in the PCC’s Police and Crime Plan.

The Plan sets out a series of commitments to prevent young people from being drawn into serious violence including developing joint approaches to crack down on knife crime throughout Derby and Derbyshire and proactively targeting activity based on need to deal with serious violence offending.