West Midlands Police stage major anti-knife operation in bus station

West Midlands Police have held a knife-arch operation at Walsall Bus Station to help reduce the amount of knife cime

Transcript

00:00Daniel Wharton with the Express, this is Star, we're here at Walsall bus station with PC

00:07Tong where we've got a police operation that's going to be underway shortly, if you could

00:11just talk a little bit about the operation itself, if you don't mind.

00:13Yeah, so we're here for Op Advance at Walsall Town Centre, we're looking at robberies, knife

00:17crime and drugs within the bus station, train station and town centre. It's a forced priority

00:23at the moment and we're taking knife crime very seriously. We've had lots of reports

00:27from the public of ground concerns and safeguarding, so today we are tackling stop searches for

00:32drugs and knifes in the town centre to help keep the public safe and everyone to feel

00:36safe in the community.

00:38Absolutely fantastic, so what are we expecting to come out of the operation today? Is it

00:44about engagement as well?

00:46Yeah, so it's about engagement, obviously telling people and explaining to people, making

00:53them feel safe, explaining about the crime and carrying a knife as well. Obviously you

00:57get a lot of good people that don't understand it, so it's just about raising awareness about

01:01what it can do and if you're going to be more likely to use it and also how we can help

01:05as the police and other agencies to help support you if you are in that situation or you know

01:09someone that is.