Criminal policies

Any notion that the surge in killings in London was a problem confined to gang members has been dispelled by the death of 17-year-old Tanesha Melbourne-Blake, who acted as a mentor for troubled children but who died in her mother’s arms after a drive-by shooting. The number of people killed in the capital has now risen to more than 50 this year, with the latest victim an 18-year-old man who was stabbed to death in an east London street on Wednesday night.

Violent crime is everyone’s problem, yet until this year it had slipped a long way down the list of pressing political issues. Terrorism continues to take up debate, as do sexual offences, especially allegations involving public figures. But grubby, everyday lawbreaking — including of a violent kind — seemed to have receded as a national problem. The news that for two months in a row London’s murder rate has been higher than New York’s has jolted the country out of this complacency.