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Work and pensions secretary says the problem must be tackled when children in problem families have not even been born Britain’s gang, gun and crime culture has to be tackled at the point when children in problem families are still in their mothers’ wombs, Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, said on Thursday as he trailed what is likely to be a landmark report on youth violence drawn up after the summer riots. The report, being prepared by Duncan Smith and the home secretary, Theresa May, will combine proposals for better parenting with tough measures to deglamorise gang membership, including increased sentences for specific offences if the perpetrator is a known gang member. Duncan Smith was speaking at briefing given by Karyn McCluskey, joint head of the violence reduction unit of Scotland, set up within Strathclyde police, and Andrew Ward, head of the Merseyside Matrix unit, responsible for fighting gun and gang crime. Both forces have cut gang crime over the past four years by an approach that brings in health visitors, social services, schools and tough law enforcement. On Merseyside the approach has been so tough that car bombs have been put outside police stations in retaliation. The work of the two forces in fighting gangs would form the kernel of the report, Duncan Smith said. Duncan Smith said solutions lay in earlier intervention with identifiable problem families, more male role models in schools, a requirement by politicians to own up that they have a gang problem, and enforcement disrupting the lives of gang leaders. He is also pressing for the Department of Health to co-operate more with other agencies, since health visitors are often among the few state agents who can get through the doors of some of the most troubled families. Duncan Smith said: “I am talking about intervening when the child is conceived, not even when born. The kids we are talking about – half of them are unable to speak, cannot form sentences, they have no sense of empathy, they cannot share toys at school, they watch their mums get beaten up regularly and sexually abused. “It is about knowing which child is at risk and then matching the child to the programmes available that we know work. “The gangs are the epicentre of the problems we face. They are the result of all this social breakdown, and they are also the drivers of it. “Kids will not cross postcode areas for work because they think they might get stabbed. You will get kids carrying knives to school who are not members of gangs, so they see a knife as a safety measure. You get massive levels of violence against women. This is the untold story of gangs – the attacks on women that treat women just as tools for men to use.” Duncan Smith said the solution did not lie in extra state spending but in much better co-operation between agencies. “There is a lot of money being spent on families and estates but it is dysfunctional money that goes to solve only short-term problems.” Calling for tougher sentences for gang membership, Ward said: “We have had a look at the US, where you can double the sentence by proving someone is part of a gang. “I think that is incredibly powerful because the people will not want to wear gang membership as a badge of honour. If we were to say that in interview you said were a member of the Crocky Crew and you have just added another five years to your gun crime offence, that would have a big impact, I tell you.” McCluskey said: “We have to have this uncomfortable conversation and say this is going to take a long time and not change policy and strategy every year, but have some bravery and set course for a long time. This is going to take 10 to 15 years. Government has got a role in saying parenting is the most important job you can do, and some mothers just don’t have skills.” She also called for “swift, visible justice that makes people own up to their behaviour. We show them the intelligence, we visit them at their house, tell them what we know about them. We get the chief in and he says to them: ‘The violence stops as of tonight. It’s over. In the next month when we catch one of you, we are going to take out your whole group, and we are going to make your life really difficult. I have got 9,000 cops and I am so powerful I can have them all outside your front door if you so wish.’” Gangs Communities Young people Iain Duncan Smith Theresa May Patrick Wintour guardian.co.uk