After Southport, Westminster is floundering. It should look to Idris Elba | Martin Kettle

The Home Office has some good ideas, but a documentary on knife crime by the actor offers the template for a new approach

The list of painful questions left behind for a wounded Britain by the trauma of the Southport stabbings is a long one. It starts with asking why Axel Rudakubana, jailed last week with a 52-year minimum prison sentence, did it. But that soon segues into wider issues of statecraft and policy. In particular, it asks whether there are measures we could now take that might, just possibly, contribute to stopping some future Rudakubana from doing the same thing.

Here the issues become more substantive. Problems of family support and parenting. The too ready availability of knives. The influence of social media. The impact of poverty. The role of schools and of exclusions. The place of policing. The repercussion of imprisonment. The effectiveness of youth services. The relevance, if any, of ideology. All these, and more. And they are merely subject headings, the doors to more detailed responses.

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