Crime-jacked

Alcohol and drugs are also helping fuel the rise of violent crime, with the use of crack cocaine reaching epidemic levels, particularly among 14- to 18-year-olds. At the same time prices of guns are tumbling - changing hands for just £200.

Tackling the rise
So can Tony Blair fulfil his promise and reverse the trend in violent crime statistics? He is certainly introducing some stringent measures, including backing a plan to cut Child Benefit from parents of persistent offenders. Police officers will be stationed in some schools to help stamp out truancy, while even ex-SAS members have been recruited to help tackle gangs on council estates.

The government is also looking at ideas of zero tolerance introduced by ex-Mayor Guiliani in New York that dramatically reduced violent crime there. A New Yorker is now six times less likely to get mugged than a Londoner.

Critics, however, say the government has already announced 50 initiatives on crime with mixed results. And Home Secretary David Blunkett has already admitted that one of those - a £20million anti-robbery scheme - has been unimpressive.

Sending more offenders to prison may not be the answer either. We have a record number of people in prison, with 70,000 behind bars. And we already lock up more young people than any other country. Yet 75 per cent of them go on to re-offend when they get out.

Home Secretary David Blunkett, however, insisted that policies recently introduced by the government would reverse the increase in crime and were 'beginning to work'. However he added: 'I am not pretending for a moment there is not a problem.'

Blair knows the importance of cracking crime. After all, his own son Euan was a victim of a mugging last October. But it isn't just Blair who should worry. A fear of violent crime was said to have massively contributed to extreme right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen's shock strong showing in the French presidential race. In Britain the BNP has fed off fears of violent crime in urban areas like Burnley.

Blair needs to get the problem under control before his reign in office is crime-jacked.