Canonbury councillor John Woolf

YOUNG women caught up in gang violence and exploitation are set to become a key focus of the Town Hall’s new strategy to reduce violence in the borough.

The plan to create a new “Young Women’s Worker” role was announced this week by Islington’s safety chief, Canonbury councillor John Woolf, as part of the Town Hall’s recently published five-year violence reduction strategy.

Cllr Woolf said women’s involvement with gangs “can take all sorts of forms – you still have dangers around county lines, sexual exploitation, violence and drugs”.

Speaking outside the Finsbury Leisure Centre’s knife bin in Bunhill, Cllr Woolf said the new Young Women’s Worker would help with “prevention, offering one-on-one support with people who are vulnerable to exploitation or gang-related harm”.

There already exist “a lot of different offers and one-to-one support for young men” caught up in gang violence, said Cllr Woolf, adding: “we’re keen that we never forget women in that.”

The council’s new strategy has been developed following a consultation of more than 700 people.

Cllr Woolf said it is “fair” to say young women are often overlooked when considering gang violence. “When we go out and listen to the community, that is one of the things that we hear,” he said.

The new the Young Women’s Worker will work full-time, said Cllr Woolf, “going into schools, going into communities, raising awareness, and then doing that one-to-one work as well”. He hopes to see the new role filled in the next year.

The council is also planning to increase its network of “parent champions” – specially trained parent volunteers who work within communities and schools to prevent knife crime and youth violence. “Violence affects individuals, it affects families, it particularly affects parents,” Cllr Woolf said.

Cllr Woolf said the Town Hall is now taking a “public health approach” to tackling crime and violence in Islington, which ranks as one of “the top 10 most dangerous boroughs in London”, according to data analysis by CrimeRate.

“We see violence like a contagious disease, which affects individuals, affects families and affects communities, and we have to tackle it at its root,” Cllr Woolf said.

In its violence reduction strategy, the Town Hall lists tackling school exclusions, deprivation, child poverty and “community wealth building” as key priorities in its “public health approach”.

Cllr Woolf said “a hell of a lot of work” has gone into tackling violence in the borough, but acknowledged “more needs to be done”.

“From communities to council services to police to the London Fire Brigade, we’re all involved, and we’re all committed to stamping out violence,” he said.