Brianna Ghey’s mum is calling on the Government to get tougher on knife crime

Brianna Ghey’s mother has made an impassioned plea for tougher measures against knife crime. Brianna, a 16-year-old transgender girl, was stabbed to death in Linear Park, Warrington, last February.

On Friday, Ms Ghey stood with two other mothers who have also lost their children to knife violence, saying they felt “disappointed” by the Government’s failure to act on the issue.

Brianna’s mother campaigned individually for stricter regulation of cell phones. She joined Kelly Brown and Leeann White in trying to amplify their collective call for change.

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Ms Ghey told ITV news that she hoped teaming up with the two mothers, who campaigned for sentencing changes and the introduction of life-saving bleeding kits, would make their message “more powerful”.

She said, “Something has to be done. It needs to change urgently. I feel like it’s our job too… even though we’ve been through something so tragic, we have to do this, we have to do this. .

“I still have hope that we can make a difference. And whether it’s the Government making a difference or mothers like us, I have hope that things will change. I have to hope that things will work out. better.”

“Everything we ask must be done and we will stand together and be stronger together.”

Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe, who were both 15 at the time of the knife attack, were given life sentences for Brianna’s “brutal, premeditated and sadistic” murder.

Labor leader Sir Keir Starmer mentioned Ms Ghey during Wednesday’s election debate when he accused Prime Minister Rishi Sunak of “making an anti-trans joke in front of the mother of a murdered trans teenager”.

He was referring to an incident in February this year in which Mr Sunak assaulted a trans man in the Commons while Brianna’s family were visiting Parliament.

Ms White said the government “needs to step up and do more” and called for tougher penalties, including custodial sentences, for carrying a knife.

Her daughter Ava, 12, was stabbed by a boy she didn’t know during a Christmas lights switch-on event in Liverpool in 2021. A 15-year-old girl was jailed on life with a minimum term of 13 years for her murder.

Mrs White said: “Children die on our streets every day. The government must make more efforts. It has to be more of a priority.”

“There has to be custodial sentences. That’s the only way change will happen in my eyes. I want custodial sentences for carrying a knife. I think if you’re caught with a knife, it’s 10 years straight. Every day, you open the newspaper, you read the news, there was another fatality…so I’d like to see harsher sentences.”

Mrs Brown’s son Rhamero West was 16 when he was stabbed to death on his first day at college in Trafford, Manchester, in 2021. Three men – Ryan Cashin, 19, Marquis Richard, 17, and Giovanni Lawrence, 20 years. – were later jailed for his murder.

Ms Brown said: “I feel like I don’t take it as seriously as I should. We discussed before, they can ban these XL thugs within three months. It took so long to ban these knives for killing our children. “

“I feel disappointed. I feel the government is not doing enough.”

Sir Keir pledged on Monday to make reducing knife crime a “moral mission” before speaking to the families of knife crime victims alongside actor Idris Elba at a meeting in west London.