The full picture, because you're old enough for it
KS4 · The Safeguard Hub · Press F11 for full screen, scroll for next slide
What percentage of people your age do you think carry a knife?
Write your number down. We'll test it.
A small minority. Far below what almost everyone guesses.
The false belief that "everyone carries" is what talks people into carrying. It is doing the recruiting.
Carrying a blade in public without good reason: up to 4 years. The offence is complete the moment you carry.
Second conviction at 16 or 17: a minimum custodial sentence. The judge's discretion is removed.
Self-defence law allows reasonable force in a genuine emergency.
It has never allowed arming yourself in advance. "For protection" is not a defence. It is a confession.
Assist or encourage an offence and you can be convicted of it. Groups at a stabbing are investigated as a group.
"I was just there" has put people in prison for murder. Choose whose beef you stand behind very carefully.
At 18: adult courts, adult sentencing, adult record.
Year 11 is nearer to that line than it feels from here.
Enhanced DBS checks: medicine, nursing, teaching, childcare, security, uniformed services. Apprenticeship offers withdrawn. US entry complicated.
A conviction at 16 is a tax on every plan that follows it.
Someone who arms you owns you. The risk is yours, the record is yours, the profit is his.
That arrangement has a name, and it is not friendship.
Serious incidents grow from small ones nobody left early. Read the direction of an evening before it arrives.
Make the agreement with your friends in advance: weapons appear, everyone goes. Leave visibly enough to be remembered leaving.
Someone stabbed: 999 immediately. Firm pressure on the wound. Never remove an embedded object. Stay.
Fast bystanders are the reason people survive.
Fearless.org: pass information with total anonymity. Childline 0800 1111, up to age 19.
Any trusted adult in school, today. If you are personally at risk, say so plainly. Protection can be put around you.