Half of all teenagers witnessed or were victims of violence in England and Wales last year, according to a landmark report by government advisers into what drives knife crime, bullying and gang rivalries.
The largest-ever survey in the UK of youngsters about the problem found “shocking and unacceptable” levels of youth violence, with 358,000 teenagers physically injured during the last 12 months.
The scale of the problem was also found to be undermining children’s education, with one in five teenagers admitting they had skipped school during the last 12 months because they felt unsafe, according to the Youth Endowment Fund (YEF).
The YEF has received £200m of government funding to prevent serious youth violence and advises the Home Office and senior police officers on what works. The research, to be published on Monday, is based on a detailed survey of 7,500 teenagers and confirms the link between poverty and youth violence.
A third of teenagers in families who rely on food banks were found to be victims of violence in the last year.
Levels of violence were most pronounced among vulnerable children, with 37% of teenagers who are supported by a social worker admitting that they had been a victim.
The findings raise serious questions over the government’s approach to tackling youth violence. Critics say it relies too heavily on granting police more powers instead of tackling the root causes.
Jon Yates, executive director of the YEF, said: “The public, including my friends, tend to think this issue affects a very small group of people instead of recognising that actually half of all teenage children are seeing or experiencing violence.
“Adults, whether politicians or not, need to recognise that levels of violence are unacceptably high. This is not playground mucking about, when you consider the numbers getting properly injured or changing their behaviour because of fear of violence.”
However, the YEF is most concerned over how few perpetrators of violence receive sufficient mentoring or therapy to amend their behaviour.
Its research – the first of its kind in western Europe – found that nine in 10 teenagers who committed violence that led to physical injury received no subsequent support.
Yet studies show that mentoring programmes can prevent violence by reducing subsequent incidents by 21%. “On a positive note, it does show that we could make a colossal difference if we wanted to,” said Yates.
He added: “Sometimes there’s a degree of fatalism about violence, a sense it’s inevitable. We forget that homicide is about half the level it was 20 years ago, and there’s no reason it can’t be much lower.”
On Saturday hundreds of mourners lined the route to the funeral of 15-year-old Elianne Andam, who was stabbed to deathon her way to school in Croydon, south London. A 17-year-old boy has been charged with her murder.
The latest high-profile murder of a teenager was last Tuesday, when 15-year-old Alfie Lewis was stabbed to death near a school in Leeds. A 14-year-old boy has been charged his murder.
From Monday, many police forces will undertake a week of action to tackle knife crime as part of Operation Sceptre, a national initiative which will include educational programmes and knife amnesties – although the YEF’s own studies indicates there is no clear evidence that knife-surrender schemes or knife-awareness initiatives work.
Elsewhere, the survey found that almost a half (47%) of teenagers said that violence or the fear of violence affected their daily lives and manifested itself in trouble sleeping, loss of appetite or difficulty concentrating at school.
“The fundamental thing that we all need is safety,” said Yates. “If you’re struggling to sleep, to travel to school or to go out and meet people because you’re afraid, it’s pretty hard to get everything else in your life working.”
The research also underlined the role of social media in propagating violence, with four in 10 teenagers believing that the technology played a role in encouraging it.
When perpetrators of violence were asked why they hurt others, more than half said it was because they felt baited, while bullying and “retaliation” were other prominent factors.
The research, which also interviewed 3,000 adults for their views on the problem of youth violence, found that teenage children were frequently the victims and the perpetrators of violence, with one in four saying they were both.
Another issue was the relatively high rates of violence involving girls, with one in 12 also admitting to perpetrating violence. Seven per cent of girls said they had been victims of sexual violence, compared with 5% of boys.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We are investing heavily in a twin-track approach to reducing youth violence, which combines early intervention and prevention with tough enforcement measures.
“Since 2019, we have invested over £170m into the development of violence reduction units in the 20 areas worst affected by serious violence. This is alongside a further £170m we have provided to fund additional, targeted police patrols, reaching over 215,000 vulnerable young people in its third year of funding alone.
“We are also investing £200m over 10 years in the youth endowment fund to understand how to better prevent youth violence.”
• The headline on this article was amended on 13 November 2023. An earlier version said that half of UK teenagers had witnessed or been victims of violence. In fact this was in England and Wales.
