Police in the worst knife-crime areas of Britain, including Manchester and Liverpool, will be told to prosecute anyone found carrying a blade, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said.
In an interview, he said carrying knives or guns was “completely unacceptable” and that officers should not be looking at cautions for offenders.
The zero-tolerance applied will be applied to 12 knife-crime hotspots, mainly in large cities.
“We have to send out a message and reinforce it with action,” he said.
“It is completely unacceptable to carry a knife or a gun. Where police have previously been cautioning people, there now has to be a presumption of prosecution.”
He also expressed worries about violent computer games featuring knives.
“No-one wants censorship or an interfering state,” he said. “But the industry has some responsibility to society and needs to exercise that.”
His intervention follows rising concern about knife crime on British streets.
