A new ban on owning zombie-style knives and machetes comes into force today in an effort to reduce knife crime.
The new ban follows a four-week amnesty scheme where owners were encouraged to hand the weapons into police, local authorities or knife crime charities.
The ban is part of efforts to reduce knife crime.
The Government plans to also ban ninja swords in the future.
Official figures show that knife crime rose by 7% in England and Wales in the year to December 2023, compared with the previous 12 months, but the total 49,489 offences recorded remained below pre-pandemic levels.
Part of the increase was driven by a rise in knifepoint robberies, which went up by a fifth year on year.
Knife-enabled homicides stood at 239 last year, broadly unchanged on the 235 recorded in 2022 and also lower than pre-pandemic figures.
However, in the year to March 2023, 82% of teenage homicide victims were killed with a knife, compared with 73% in the previous year.
Chairman of the National Police Chiefs’ Council Gavin Stephens welcomed the ban, but said enforcement is only one part of reducing knife crime.
He said: “We’re acutely conscious that bans and the legislation and enforcement is only one part of the equation, and we know that there’s a lot for us to do across the full range of our policing activities to deter young people from violence.
“We’re not going to solve the problem of knife crime just by one aspect of it.”
