What on earth are we going to do to stop this epidemic of knife crime in our country. There’s not a day goes by when we don’t hear reports of a stabbing or someone tragically losing their life after being stabbed. It’s horrific and it seems to be getting worse. The number of youngsters losing their life is heartbreaking and the ripple effects of that happening to friends and family is immense.

When I was younger, I don’t remember anyone carrying a knife but now it’s so common place. If we fell out with someone, we might have a few fisticuffs and that would be it, no one ever dared to draw a knife. Lots of us had them for fishing as well as arts and crafts but that was as far as it got.

The first time I noticed a change was several years ago when I was playing five a side. There was a scrap on the adjacent pitch and one of the players immediately ran to his kit bag and started brandishing a knife. I was totally shocked, one minute it was a falling out between two players the next moment a knife is pulled. Thankfully I was playing alongside a police officer at the time who dealt with the situation. Today this sort of thing has reached epidemic levels, and it must stop. People today say they carry knives for protection but the truth of the matter is if they get into an altercation it raises the stakes.

So, what do we do? Increase stop and search? Have airport style security at schools, pubs, and clubs? All seem a bit extreme but its extreme measures that we need to stamp this out. Something the government has mentioned this week for the umpteenth time is that they are going to ban the sale of zombie type weapons. Why keep announcing it, just do it!

Yes, I know if someone is hell bent on getting a knife they can get one from a kitchen drawer but the more difficult we can make it the better.

Several years ago, I worked closely with the then Chief Constable Simon Ash to tackle knife crime. A young man had lost his in a knife incident and I asked him on my radio show: “Why do you only have a knife amnesty when someone dies?” It was a lightbulb moment for us both and Bin a Blade was born. We created several permanent big yellow knife amnesty bins, which saw thousands of bladed items taken off our streets. We promoted a knife crime rap and a play aimed at school kids. Maybe Suffolk Police could relaunch the campaign, it’s needed more than ever.

To stamp this out a concerted effort like this needs to happen and not just for a short time but all the time. It’s one of the scourges of our society today. Parents, teachers, politicians, councils, and the police need to all work together to stop this happening. Perhaps if some of our national politicians stopped squabbling with each other and got stuck into this instead it wouldn’t be so bad. If we had more places for young people to go that would help but loads have been closed by council cuts. We need to send the message that it’s not cool to carry a knife. We’ve seen in the last week or two Idris Elba saying just that and calling for knives to be banned from sale.

We’ve got to start working on community spirit again, looking out for each other and as I said last week showing respect for the law.

We must all try and do something together before more lives are lost.