A regional daily has stepped up its campaign against knife crime by launching a new body to tackle the issue.

The Northern Echo has announced its intention to launch the North East Knife Crime Taskforce, a public forum that will bring together organisations including police forces, councils and schools to fight the problem in the North-East of England.

The Echo launched its campaign in October with the backing of Zoey McGill and Tanya Brown, whose 18-year-old sons Jack Woodley and Connor Brown were both stabbed to death in separate incidents.

Last month Sir Keir Starmer vowed to use the testimony of the two grieving mothers to help form Labour policy on knife crime after the Darlington-based daily arranged for them to meet.

The Echo splashed on its fresh move on Tuesday, above, and says it intends to have a section of its website dedicated to the North East Knife Crime Taskforce with useful information for organisations involved in working with young people.

The aim is for it to include contact details, articles about how to access funding and success stories on projects taking place in the North-East that can be adapted for different areas.

The paper is also proposing to produce downloadable teaching materials that can be used classrooms, and in youth and community centres, to teach young people about the dangers of picking up blades.

Resources will include “hard-hitting videos, using social media to reach vulnerable members of society who may be at risk of getting involved in anti-social behaviour and knife crime”.

Editor Gavin Foster told HTFP: “Our ongoing campaign is to shine a light on the tragic impact of knife crime and what is needed to make a change.

“We’ve shared the heartbreaking stories of victims and families who have lost loved ones, we’ve listened to the concerns of those battling the scourge on the streets and listened to the views of politicians and decision-makers as to what needs to happen.

“It was clear to us that if we want to make a difference, we need to bring those voices together to create a task force of collective voices in the hope that greater noise will be heard – a force for change.”