Types of knives and weapons seized during stop and searches from 2019 to 2014

Freedom of information request reference no: 01.FOI.24.037800

I note you seek access to the following information:

For each of the calendar years 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023, as well as 2024 to date, please provide a breakdown of the number and type of knives and other weapons seized/recovered from stop and searches.

Please break the data down by the number of:

Kitchen and other knives
Rambo’ knives
Hunting knives
Stanley knives
Lock knives
Machetes
Zombie knives
Swords
Other pointed/bladed articles or weapons
Firearms

Please state the date that 2024 data is accurate to.

If any year is not available, please still provide data for all requested years that are and prioritise data for 2023.

I am working on the basis that you do have this data as you have provided it previously for 2021 in answer to a Mayor’s Question.

Decision

I have today decided to disclose the located information to you in full. Please find below information pursuant to your request above.

Please see the spreadsheet below for data for the years 2021, 2022 and 2023, broken down by type of weapon.

Unfortunately, it has not been possible to locate, extract and retrieve data pre 2021, or for 2024 to date. This is because data broken down to the granularity you are seeking for those years has not been previously extracted or collated. To identify the data for those years would require record level searches of thousands of stop and search records which would take a single member of staff hundreds of hours and would far exceed the appropriate cost limit under the Act. It should be noted that this would normally lead to your entire request being cost refused, however, as you have included a proviso in your request that If any year is not available we should still provide data for all requested years that are, we have made the decision to disclose the data that has been located.