Safer Burton Campaign Aims
THE Mail’s Safer Burton campaign has three aims — prevention, education and reassurance.
PREVENTION: Through our coverage — and with the backing of posters, stickers, a specially created video, classroom talks, Facebook and Twitter — we aim to create a high-profile, highly visible initiative to raise awareness of issues like knife crime and deter people from carrying weapons.
EDUCATION: Yvonne Upton’s brave decision to take the message out into schools and colleges will help us to educate youngsters about the dangers of a knife culture, the harsh reality of the human suffering it can cause and the impact on the lives of families left behind to pick up the pieces.
REASSURANCE: We feel many people already understand and appreciate that Burton’s streets are as safe as any comparable town and considerably more so than many. Through prevention and education, we hope to reassure any doubters by creating a knife-free zone populated by a generation educated not to carry weapons.
Mail editor Kevin Booth said: “Let me make it clear from the outset, we are not saying that there is a major problem in the town centre with knives. Far from it.
“What we are saying is that the death of one young man in 2010 was a tragedy we never want to happen again.
“There is a message we want to get out there, and Yvonne’s heart-breaking account of events surrounding her son’s death is a very strong, powerful and emotive story to help us start to put it across.”
The campaign is backed by Yvonne Upton, Burton MP Andrew Griffiths, police, representatives of Pubwatch and town centre venues, and has cross-party support from locallyelected councillors.
Should our campaign be successful, the long-term aim is to role out Safer Burton to help tackle other issues including car crime, drug abuse and anti-social behaviour.
