After string of assaults in London, Home Office and MPs look at licensing, sentencing and policing issues

The Home Office is considering tough new restrictions on corrosive substances after a string of acid attacks in London, amid calls from one London MP for more severe sentences for possession of harmful acids.

On Friday two teenage boys, a 15-year-old and a 16-year-old, were arrested as police launched a major investigation into a five acid attacks that took place in less than 90 minutes across east London, with one victim said to have suffered life-changing injuries.

The Labour MP for East Ham, Stephen Timms, said carrying acid should be made an offence and suggested licensing the purchase of sulphuric acid, likening it to carrying a knife.

However, the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) has said it is virtually impossible to ban the sale of all corrosive substances because many are household products, such as bleach and drain cleaner, available over the counter.

The latest series of attacks came after data seen by the Guardian revealed that the number of crimes using acid or other “noxious substances” more than doubled in London over the last three years. There were 455 crimes in London last year where a corrosive substance was used or threatened to be used; a quarter were street robberies.

Last week, a 27-year-old man suffered severe burns after being squirted with acid in Mile End, east London. The previous month, two Muslim men were attacked sitting in their car at traffic lights in east London, which police said they were treating as a hate crime.



A woman and her cousin were also attacked with acid on her 21st birthday in Beckton, east London, in June. Resham Khan, the woman who was attacked, launched an appeal from her hospital bed for a “zero-tolerance stance” on acid attacks.

Several Labour MPs are also planning parliamentary action on the issue. Timms will lead an adjournment debate in the House of Commons on Monday and Lyn Brown, the MP for neighbouring West Ham where attacks also took place last month, is drafting a 10-minute rule bill to propose in the autumn.



“I think that the sentences for attacks of this kind should be reviewed – the guidelines for sentencing,” Timms told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. “I think we should have tougher and also more consistent sentences for those who are found guilty of carrying out these attacks.

“Carrying acid should in itself be an offence, in the same way that carrying a knife wouldn’t have been an offence some years ago. I think there’s been a pretty effective change – I think the same change should be made for acid.”

Play Video 1:02 Cressida Dick condemns ‘barbaric’ acid attacks – video

Police said the attackers who struck on Friday night in east London targeted five people and doused them with corrosive liquid in separate assaults between 10.25pm and 11.37pm, as well as stealing mopeds.

Timms, who himself was the victim of a knife attack at his constituency surgery in 2010, said sulphuric acid was a dangerous substance that should require a licence to buy. “Sulphuric acid is already covered by the explosives precursors regulations introduced last year, but it’s in a kind of lower category in those regulations,” he said. “I think it should be raised to the higher category, which would mean you’d have to have a licence in order to buy it.”

The shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, said the government did not “have the tools necessary” to prevent the attacks given the few prosecutions, blaming limits to police capacity.

“Just like knives and guns, acid is being used in murders, robberies and rapes. The problem is the weapon of choice is often a common household product,” she said.

“While the Tories arrogantly insist that they have protected the police budget, the reality is they have cut numbers by over 20,000, leaving our forces overstretched as they work tirelessly to keep the public and our communities safe.”

The Home Office minister Sarah Newton said her department had hosted a joint meeting with the NPCC last week to explore the nature of acid attacks and to take advice from medical experts, police, retailers, and officials from a number of government departments and agencies.

“We are currently considering a range of measures, which includes with retailers what action can be taken to restrict access to the most harmful products used in acid and other corrosive substance attacks,” she told the Commons this week.

Newton told the Today programme the Home Office was “increasingly concerned about the escalation of incidents, especially in London, so we have been working with the Metropolitan police and community policing on this for some months now. If there is more we can do, yes we will take more action.”

Brown told the Guardian her initial research ahead of her 10-minute rule bill had showed motives and victims were varied, but the rise was linked to gang crime and street robberies. The MP said the ease with which corrosive substances could be obtained was shocking – with her staff finding a litre of corrosive chemical on sale on retail website Amazon for “under a fiver”.

The MP said her bill could examine sentencing, licensing restrictions and policing guidelines. “If you’re using a knife, it’s attempted murder, but acid is only GBH, and it can kill,” she said. “You cannot stop and search every young person carrying a Lucozade bottle because of what might be in it – but you can search on the basis of intelligence and we know the attacks have been linked to gang crime.”

Theresa May’s spokesman said: “The prime minister’s view is that the use of acid in this way is horrific.”

He added: “It’s already an offence to carry a corrosive substance with an intent to cause harm; anyone using it can be prosecuted for a very serious offence of ABH or GBH. We are working with the police to see what more we can do.”

However, No 10 hinted it was highly likely there would be new restrictions on corrosive substances, following the meeting at the Home Office. “We want to work with stakeholders to see what more can be done,” the spokeswoman said.

The Met police commissioner, Cressida Dick, speaking on LBC on Friday morning, said it was “probably in some respects easier” than people think it ought to be to buy the substances. “Some of them are things that are frequently used in domestic situations and others, of course, why on earth would a normal person need sulphuric acid, for example, why would you need that?” she said.