'Shocking' 20% rise in knife attack victims treated in A&E

HOSPITAL admissions after knife attacks rose by a fifth last year, new figures have revealed.

There was also an increase in people needing treatment following assaults with blunt instruments and firearms.

It has led to calls for pilot schemes in Glasgow, Fife, Edinburgh and Lanarkshire – where victims provide intelligence for police on where attacks took place when entering A&E – to be rolled out nationwide.

The new figures, revealed by the Scottish Liberal Democrats, show the number of people going to hospital after knife attacks rose from 1,593 in 2008 to 1,857 in 2009, after assault with a blunt object from 658 to 709, and after assault with a firearm from 15 to 17.

Robert Brown MSP, justice spokesman for the Scottish Liberal Democrats, said: "Our figures reveal a spike in the number of people being admitted to hospital after assaults.

"The Scottish Government has to crack down on the culture of violence that is blighting our communities.

"Hospitals have unique access to the statistics behind the Friday and Saturday night brawls, gang fights and brutal attacks that fill the news bulletins and papers."

He said many of the incidents are never reported to the police.

He added: "This can be extraordinarily helpful to police when it comes to mapping out violence hotspots and targeting them with high visibility policing.

''That's why we want all A&E departments to collect anonymous information on the time, location and nature of violent assaults."

The Scottish Labour and Conservative parties have both called for automatic prison sentences for people caught carrying knives.

James Kelly, community safety spokesman for Scottish Labour, said: ''These shocking figures highlight the tragic toll knife crime is taking on communities across Scotland.

"Last year almost 2,000 victims of knife crime were admitted to Scottish hospitals, at a cost to the NHS of more than 500m. That's 500m that could have been spent on Scottish schools, hospitals, children or older people.

"Knives were used in a record 58 per cent of all murders last year – more than at any time in the last 20 years. The knife murder rate in Scotland is more than double the UK average.

A Scottish Government spokesman said: "We are taking tough action on those who carry and use knives – doing more than ever before – as well as delivering a record number of police officers to catch them. Crimes of handling an offensive weapon have decreased by 11 per cent since 2006-7.''

The pilot is based on a study in Cardiff which saw violent crime fall by a fifth. It will be evaluated in a year and then potentially rolled out nationwide.