They've all lost the plot v.2

More fresh madness from the UK: Knife-wielding thugs will avoid jail.

Violent thugs who terrorise our streets with knives will be allowed to escape with only a fine, it was announced today.

New guidelines issued to magistrates mean that knife-carrying yobs will be let off with just slap on the wrist. Terrifying thugs who are caught carrying a blade for the first time will be 'punished' with only a fine or a community order. And even if it can be proved that the youths or violent gangs are threatening innocent victims with knives, they will still only face up to 12 weeks jail time. The new guidelines came from Britain's most senior judge, Lord Chief Justice Phillips, through the Sentencing Guidelines Council and come just hours after a man was fatally stabbed in broad daylight on London's bustling Oxford street yesterday.

The 22-year-old man was seen leaving McDonalds only to be ambushed by two men and have his throat slit - leaving him bleeding to death in full-view of hundreds of horrified shoppers, who fled the busy shopping district as the innocent man collapsed on the street. The two killers escaped but a blood-stained pen-knife was discovered only 50 metres away. A witness said: “I just heard the screaming and then saw a couple of guys run past us.”

Yesterday's sickening murder is the fifth in London in only two weeks. Innocent schoolboy Jimmy Mizen, 16. was murdered in a bakery on Saturday in south east London and two youths were wounded in a double stabbing in Holloway, north London only the day after.

Gordon Brown's inability to tackle the surging crime on Britain's streets has made a mockery of Labour's famous promise to crack down on "crime and the causes of crime."

London’s newly-appointed Deputy Mayor for Young People, Ray Lewis, described the problem of crime in the capital as a “rising onslaught”.“I think we need to ask ourselves why we are where we are in the first place,” he said. “Because this isn’t a blow-out, this is a slow leak.“This has been an increasing and steadily rising onslaught of lawlessness and abandoned behaviour for a number of years.”

Newly-appointed London mayor Boris Johnson has vowed to put a stop to the horrific murders happening everyday on British streets - 68 young people under 25 have been killed with knives or guns since January.