A Fine Gael TD has called for a “crackdown” on knife crime, urging Ireland to follow recent UK policy as a model for getting knives “off our streets.”
Speaking in a statement on Monday, Dublin Rathdown TD Maeve O’Connell said the growing use of bladed weapons against Gardaí was “deeply disturbing” and posed a serious risk to public safety.
“The fact that our Gardaí are being injured with bladed weapons more and more often is deeply disturbing,” she said.
“I want to extend my full support to the Gardaí injured on duty both last week and over the weekend and wish them a full and speedy recovery.”
O’Connell said the most recent incident took place in her own constituency, describing it as “yet another reminder that knife crime is not a distant issue” and was “putting lives at risk, including those of the Gardaí who protect us.”
She noted that tougher sentencing laws for knife offences were introduced last year by then Justice Minister Helen McEntee, but said further measures were needed.
“We need to keep up the crackdown on knife crime,” she said.
“That means strong enforcement, tougher checks at points of sale to control the flow of these weapons, and a renewed focus on prevention and education, particularly among young people.”
O’Connell said she will raise the matter directly with the Justice Minister and seek a review to ensure frontline officers are “fully supported” in tackling knife crime.
“No one should go to work fearing they’ll be attacked with a weapon,” she said.
“We owe it to our Gardaí and to every community affected by this violence to act now.”
She pointed to a UK knife amnesty earlier this year in which over 1,000 weapons were handed in, saying it showed such measures can be effective.
“The news last week that over 1,000 weapons have been handed in as part of a UK amnesty operation shows that taking these weapons off our streets is possible, and we need to act now,” she said.
Notably, the UK has experienced significant knife crime rates in recent years. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), England and Wales saw 53,047 “offences involving knives or sharp instruments” in the year ending March 2025 – an 89.3% increase on the 28,008 recorded a decade earlier.
As reported by BBC News in May, police in Cambridgeshire piloted home visits as part of a knife amnesty, offering collection of banned weapons such as knives, machetes, knuckledusters, extendable batons, curved swords and “zombie” knives. The operation also included school visits and extra patrols in known hotspots, with more than 160 knives seized during 215 additional stop searches.
The Fine Gael TD’s call comes after a stabbing in the Capel Street area of Dublin on July 29th, during which a probationer Garda was injured while on patrol. RTÉ reported that 23-year-old Abdullah Khan has been charged with assault causing harm and with producing a knife capable of causing serious injury under the Firearms and Offensive Weapons Act.