Concerns over rise in police taser use on children

Speaking at an event in Westminster, Anna Edmundson, senior policy and public affairs adviser at the Children's Rights Alliance for England (Crae), warned that that there has been a "marked" increase in the use by police of tasers - a weapon used to deliver electric shocks - on children in the capital.

Addressing a panel made up of five young people and Labour's shadow minister for London Andy Slaughter, Edmundson said that Crae is concerned about tasers because they inflict "intolerable pain".

She said that nationally there was a 25 per cent increase in the use of tasers on children between 2013 and 2015, but in London there has been a 12-fold increase.

??She said that in 2008 tasers were "used" - a definition that includes a taser being removed from the holster, aimed, or discharged - nine times on children in London. In 2012 they were used 53 times and in 2015 they were used 125 times, including being fired three times at children.

In the first nine months of 2016 there have been 108 uses on children including being fired four times. Extrapolated across the entire 12 months, this indicates there could be a rise of as much as 33 per cent this year.

??"The youngest person on who the taser was used was only 11 years old," she said.