Morrisons has become the first British supermarket to stop selling sharp-pointed kitchen knives, replacing them with blunt-ended alternatives that cannot pierce skin — in a move backed by anti-knife charities and survivors of some of Britain’s most devastating knife attacks.
The retail giant has switched to Viners’ rounded-tip Assure Collection across its stores, with David Scott, Morrisons’ corporate affairs director, saying the knives were “just as effective in the kitchen but reduce the risk of harm.” He added that the company hoped the move would “help normalise safer knives and make our communities safer.”
The decision comes as knife crime continues to rise sharply. Police recorded 49,151 offences involving a knife or sharp instrument last year — a figure up 50 per cent over the past decade and one that has intensified pressure on retailers, politicians and public institutions to take practical action.
Among those who have pushed hardest for exactly this kind of change is Leanne Lucas, 36, a yoga instructor who survived the Southport attack of July 2024 in which Axel Rudakubana, then 17, killed three young girls and injured ten others with an eight-inch kitchen knife. Lucas launched the Let’s Be Blunt Campaign last year, urging MPs and businesses to make the switch to rounded-tip knives. “The horror I saw that day must never be repeated,” she said.
The Ben Kinsella Trust, a knife crime prevention charity, has backed her campaign throughout. Trust chief Patrick Green said blunted knives “remove the opportunity, the impulsivity” and “make things safer for everyone.”
The move by Morrisons is expected to increase pressure on rival supermarkets to follow suit, with anti-knife campaigners describing it as a significant moment in the effort to reduce the availability of weapons capable of causing fatal stab wounds.
