The Save EMA campaign has warned previously that an increase in youth crime could be seen if the EMA is abolished, as some cuts can help cause crime. Talking to Sky News today, Diane Abbot MP and many others on other media platforms, have said today that many teenagers rioting have been spurred on by the abolition of EMA.

Now, Save EMA doesn’t fully agree with that view, but it does have a kernel of truth to it.

In the areas where riots took place last night involving teenagers there was almost 16,000 teenager in receipt of EMA. Those same areas which experienced riots over the weekend are also amongst the areas with the highest number of EMA recipients in London:

Lambeth (Brixton) has 3,799 recipients

Enfield has 4,424 recipients

Haringey has 3,689 recipients

Waltham Forest has 3,756 recipients

Total Number of EMA recipients: 15,934

Compare these figures with more tranquil areas such as Richmond-upon-Thames or Chelsea and Kensington who have only 900 EMA recipients each.

If you add to this the disturbance occruing in Hackney the 3,647 teenagers on EMA there, then this pushes the total number in receipt of EMA up to 19,581. This means almost a quarter of the total number of EMA recipients in London lived in areas experiencing rioting teenagers…

The Save EMA campaign believes in peaceful protest and completely rejects violence in all its forms. There is no excuse whatsoever for stealing or criminal damage. And Save EMA has previously condemned all such actions seen following education demonstrations. However, it also believes that some cuts can help cause crime by creating an environment in which it can grow.

There was no excuse for the violence over the weekend, and we must remember those teenagers who did not take part in any criminal activity at all. But as we survey the damage we cannot ignore that the environment which was created that made riots more likely in places like Brixton than in places like Belgravia.

For example, as the figures above show, there are four times as many youngsters on EMA in Haringey than in Richmond-upon-Thames and there are four times as many youngsters on EMA in Lambeth than in Chelsea and Kensington. Is it hard therefore to wonder why we see more teenagers involved riots in some parts of London than others? The figures above of EMA recipients London highlight the disparity in poverty levels in those different parts of London.

It is hard to prove that removing EMA alone will increase crime, however, if it leads to lower levels of participation in education amongst 16-19 years olds then this is what one well respected academic, Mick Fletcher, who has advised the government has said the effects can be:

Youth Unemployment in London is above the national average, and combined with cuts to youth services and the abolition of the EMA there is an abandoned army of young people set adrift, one just has to ask any youth worker or sociologist or criminologist and they will tell you this is the environment that breeds crime.

The Save EMA campaign has met many young people over the last year and as the videos like the one below shows, many of them have been saying that if they don’t have successful schemes like EMA then they are more likely to get into trouble.

Although the Save EMA campaign doesn’t fully agree with Diane Abbott MP’s view that cutting EMA has led to the disturbances in London, we do share her fears that last weekend maybe a sign of more things to come if the abolition of successful schemes like EMA goes ahead.

The government should not risk creating a lost generation of unqualified and unskilled young people, who feel that the government is against them and that they are not worth investing in, otherwise it only helps create such scenes already seen…

Save EMA sends its sympathies to those who have been hurt or affected by the riots!

UPDATE: Following recent out bursts of violence in London, the figure has been revised up to over a third of EMA recipients in London living in riot hotspots.