Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has given an interview this morning, and he was asked about the sentencing of Nottingham killer Valdo Calocane.
Calocane was sentenced to detention in a high-security hospital after prosecutors accepted his manslaughter plea rather than pursuing a murder conviction.
The sentence could be referred to the Court of Appeal after the attorney general received a complaint arguing it’s too lenient.
Asked for his view, Sir Keir told ITV’s This Morning he recognised the “raw pain” the families of the victims are experiencing and he “can’t imagine” what they are going through.
He went on: “As far as the sentence is concerned, obviously there are mental health issues in this particular case, and the attorney general has got the power to review it and I think that probably makes sense and have it double-checked by the Court of Appeal.
“But I think, alongside the sentence, I am very worried by what appear to be a number of points at which action could have been taken that would have prevented this happening.
“The family are saying that needs to be an inquiry into that. I think they’re right about that.
“I think somebody outside of this, [who’s] independent, needs to look at exactly what happened, what were the points of which there could have been an intervention and why it didn’t happen.
“That is the least that these families are owed.”
Sir Keir went on to say: “Of all the things I’ve ever done in politics or law, talking to a parent who’s lost their child to a knife attack is the most difficult.”
He said he as prime minister would make tackling knife crime a key focus, and said zombie knives have still not been banned, adding in a message to the government: “Get on with it.”
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