There is considerable alarm about the gun and knife crime on our streets today. It seems that not a day goes by without a media report of a stabbing or shooting incident in London.

Here in Streatham, the shooting of 16 year old James Andre Smartt-Ford at Streatham Ice Rink (outside which I am pictured with a youth worker) on 2 February 2007 was one of the first in a wave of teenage murders to come to national prominence. Months later, on 22 October 2007, there was the shooting of Gary “Curry Cat” Guthrie at the Starlight Room nightclub behind the Ice Rink (the trial of the seven men accused of his murder takes place in January). On 31 March this year a teenager was shot in the face on Tierney Road. This list is by no means exhaustive.

Each and every incident is shocking, all the more so when it results in death. Unfortunately I have not had time to do justice to these issues in a post on this website this week, but I do intend to blog in much greater detail in this regard in the coming months. For the moment, here are some brief thoughts.

Firstly, I think it is important to get these issues in perspective. Yes there is a problem – no one would deny that when faced with the statistics of young people tragically killed over the last 18 months – but it is still a minority engaging in this kind of violence. The Home Office estimates that just 5% of young people are responsible for half of all youth crime, so lets not demonise the majority of them.  Mark Easton, BBC News’ Home Affairs editor (right) did a very good blog this week on our teenagers – “10 reasons to cheer our teenagers” – which is well worth reading.

Secondly, knife and gun crime is not the sole preserve of young people as the murder of Gary Guthrie demonstrates. Guthrie was aged 35 and all those charged with his murder are aged 20 or over. Lets not forget there is knife and gun crime being committed across all age groups which must be addressed.

Thirdly, the government is taking action, not only to crack down hard on those committing these dreadful offences, but also to prevent people getting involved in this kind of activity in the first place as the Youth Crime Action Plan published on Tuesday demonstrates.

Elements of the Youth Crime Action Plan include street based teams of youth workers and ex-gang members to tackle groups of young people involved in crime and disorder, giving the community the opportunity to say what type of work they want young people on community sentences to do undertake and expanding youth centre provision. This builds on measures we have introduced to tackle crime more generally such as Safer Neighbourhood Teams.