Middlesbrough Football Club recently launched their ‘No More Red’ campaign in collaboration with the Chris Cave Foundation, aimed at tackling knife crime in the area. Daniel Wales reports from the launch.
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00:00On the pitch, Middlesbrough are having a successful campaign in the championship, sat just outside
00:08of the play-off places, and only seven points from those in the automatic promotion spots
00:12at the top of the table.
00:16Of it, they recently launched a campaign looking to help tackle knife crime in the area, with
00:21the help of a locally based charity, the Chris K Foundation.
00:24But why is this such an important issue for the population in this area, especially younger
00:29people?
00:33According to a recent study by the Office for National Statistics, outside of London
00:38and the West Midlands, the Cleveland area is the worst in the country for knife crime,
00:42with the club providing further details on the pressing matter.
00:47Theresa Cave of the Chris Cave Foundation explained more, including why she set up the
00:52charity.
00:53I work with the Chris Cave Foundation, I founded it in 2003, when my son was murdered, he was
00:59stabbed to death in a totally unprovoked knife attack in Redcar, and we just wanted
01:03to make something good come out of something so bad.
01:06I won't say a dream come true, but it is for knife crime a dream come true, because it's
01:09something that's going to be so big, and it's going to show the whole country that the borough
01:15are standing up and doing something so positively, in a way that it hasn't been done before.
01:23The club approached me and asked me to get involved in the new campaign, I didn't know
01:26anything about it, we went to a meeting, and I was just blown away by it, I had to
01:30get involved, you know, and I went home and told Tom about it, and Tom was over the moon,
01:35the team were over the moon, so it's a win-win sit, it's a win-win.
01:38At the launch, borough player Hayden Hackney spoke about the club's one-off white shirt.
01:43I really like it, it's all white, I think it's like the home kit, but it's all white,
01:47so I do really like it.
01:49We advise people not to wear red on Saturday, to raise as much awareness as we can, so hopefully
01:56we can do that.
01:57Like you say, me and Dale were here today, and it means a lot to us because we are from
02:02this area, so hopefully we can change that.
02:05Given his local heritage, Hackney made clear his pride at representing Middlesbrough.
02:10Yeah, it's a dream, I always say it's a dream, but it is, and that's what I grew up wishing
02:16I could do, and now I'm doing it, so it's great.
02:20Hackney's presence at the launch was hugely welcomed by Theresa Cave.
02:24It is, it's absolutely amazing.
02:26You can't get better, can you?
02:28You can't get a better campaign than this, and I know it's not a competition, having
02:32campaigns, but you can't do anything, you can't get a better campaign, and like I say,
02:36if the whole country clicks onto this, and they all follow suit, and everyone does a
02:40little bit, then maybe the whole of the country's knife crime pandemic will come down.
02:45It should spread so far because young people need to know how precious they are, and they
02:49need to know that they're our future generation, and we need them here to be our future generation,
02:54and if there's a different avenue to go down, go down that avenue.