The Reading Evening Post will relaunch its Knives Cost Lives campaign after a local teenager was stabbed to death.

Scores of readers contacted the newspaper after it ran the story of 17-year-old Robert Spence who was stabbed outside a fast food shop earlier this month.

The tragedy has prompted the Post to relaunch the campaign which had successfully pushed for tougher sentences on knife crime.

Originally set up in 2006, it received the backing of then Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer and saw a 3,000-strong petition calling for tougher sentences for knife crime delivered to Downing Street.

The Evening Post is set to launch a new fund-raising drive to pay for the production of a £5,000 video.

It will warn youngsters of the dangers of knives and be shown at each of the town's ten secondary schools.

Evening Post deputy editor Hilary Scott said: "The core message is that knives do cost lives.

"We want to educate youngsters and tell them that by carrying a knife you're not only putting yourself at huge risk of being stabbed, but also of receiving a jail sentence."

With the campaign gaining the support of local businesses and other parties, the newspaper hopes to organise events to promote the message such as a hip-hop concert in the town centre for under-18s.

Thames Valley Police have backed the campaign as has Reading East MP Rob Wilson who delivered the newspaper's petition to Downing Street in April last year.

Wristbands which the Post sold to members of the public to raise cash when the campaign first took off will go back on sale.

Reading Pubwatch has pledged to promote flyer, plasma screen and poster campaigns in the town's licensed premises and a local shopping centre has plegded £1,000.

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