Southwark community wardens discover over 50 weapons in year’s worth of sweeps

Among the retrieved weapons were one imitation gun and 18 knives, including a hunting knife with a serrated 12" blade, discovered in a tower block on an estate in Walworth.

The figures emerged as part of an audit of recovered weapons in the last year, as the community wardens carried out both planned and ad hoc weapons sweeps.

The council is working closely with the police in getting dangerous weapons off the street.

Cllr John Friary, cabinet member for community safety at Southwark Council, said: "Our wardens have a great profile around Southwark in their day to day work patrolling the borough and reassuring the community. But it's their behind-the-scenes work such as this, recovering potentially lethal weapons, which shows how important their work is.

"The community has told us that removing weapons from our streets is a top priority, and this work by our wardens is in direct response to their concerns."

Superintendent Steve Deehan from Southwark Police added: "Local police are working hard to prevent the carrying of knives and the work of wardens and our safer neighbourhood teams in carry out weapons sweeps significantly reduces the availability of knives to commit crime and makes the borough safer for everyone"

Further information

As well as the knives, also recovered were class A drugs in three cases, and a large number of other implements (e.g. metal poles, hammers, and screwdrivers), all of which could be potential weapons.

For more information on the community wardens please visit the community safety and enforcement page.

The work of the wardens complements other community safety work of the council in keeping knives off the streets and out of the hands of inappropriate users.

• Last year Southwark Council launched the Knife Charter Plus, a voluntary agreement between the council and local retailers which sets out tougher requirements around knife sales.
• The council's trading standards team also works alongside the police in this area. Operation Blunt 2, an ongoing operation run by the Metropolitan Police, included a month long initiative to tackle underage knife sales.
• Southwark Council's proof of age card (SPA card) was the first to be introduced in London, and since its launch in 2007 around 2,600 young people have signed up.
• Southwark Council's partnership activities aimed at tackling knife enabled crime have been recognised nationally as best practice. The council's work was hailed as best practice in a House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee and was a finalist in the Municipal Journal Achievement Awards in 2009.

In the last financial year April 2009 to March 2010 the council's Community Wardens conducted 132 pre-planned weapon sweeps, as well as unscheduled sweeps.