Greater Manchester Violence Reduction Unit

Greater Manchester Violence Reduction Unit

Addressing the underlying causes of violence and working
together with communities to prevent it.

Play Video about Kate Green smiling

Working to reduce violence in Greater Manchester

Greater Manchester Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) is a team of subject leads and experts from Greater Manchester Police (GMP), Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA), Greater Manchester National Probation Service, Public Health, NHS, Education, Community Voluntary Sector, Victim’s Voice, Youth Justice and Local Authorities, addressing the underlying causes of violence and working together with communities to prevent it.

Under the direct governance and oversight of the Deputy Mayor of Greater Manchester, Greater Manchester Combined Authority plays host to the VRU.

The Greater Than Violence Strategy

A group of young people standing in front of a graffiti wall

The Greater than Violence strategy commits to working together with individuals and communities to understand their strengths, challenges, and ideas to tackle violence.

Led by the Mayor and Deputy Mayor of Greater Manchester, the Greater than Violence Strategy will work to improve lives by preventing violence, supporting victims, families and communities affected, and providing positive opportunities to those at risk of becoming victims, witnesses, or perpetrators, including education programmes, community sports, targeted mentoring, opportunities to develop new skills and therapeutic support.

The strategy is founded on two pillars: preventing violence from happening and responding swiftly and appropriately when it occurs.

Community-led approach

The community-led approach to violence reduction, means the VRU works closely with communities to understand the strengths, challenges, and needs of the community and determine how local investments will be made.

Several boroughs across the city-region have received funding from the VRU as part of its investment in community-led programmes, outlined in Greater Manchester’s Serious Violence Action Plan.

Public health approach

“The key objective is to ensure we take a public health approach, working collaboratively and in partnership where we come together and our policies are strongly aligned. We’ll be looking at our trends, information and evidence to find solutions collaboratively with our partners” – Helen Lowey.

Take a look at our latest initatives

Hope Hack

Young people from across Greater Manchester have shared their views, thoughts, and ideas on how to make the city region a safer and fairer place for all.

Navigator Project

The Greater Manchester Navigator Project is a youth-focused, violence reduction project based in four Greater Manchester hospitals.

The Social Switch Project

The Social Switch Project is switching the narrative on how social media’s relationship to youth violence is understood, tackled and solved.

Speaking Out Could Save a Life

Greater Manchester comes together to stop knife crime and serious violence.

Latest News
All Blog Uncategorised
Community Spotlight: Mancunian Way ‘Reducing violence is a by-product of building trust’
A Manchester-based charity is supporting young people at risk of becoming involved in crime to reach their goals through employment support, mentoring and providing a safe space to talk about their worries. Mancunian Way is an anti-social behaviour reduction charity based in central Manchester that works to reduce anti-social behaviour (ASB) create safety in communities […]
7 June 2024
Bleed control skills to help Greater Manchester’s young people save lives
More than 3,000 school children and members of the public across Greater Manchester have been taught vital skills around how to recognise and stop life-threatening bleeds. ‘Stop the Bleed Day’ is an annual initiative created in partnership between Greater Manchester’s Violence Reduction Unit and charity, citizenAID. Since the pilot in 2023, schools across the city-region […]
29 May 2024
Standing up for women and girls in Greater Manchester
Reflecting on the recent ‘Standing Up for Women and Girls’ event at Manchester Metropolitan University Being a young woman today presents lots of opportunity, however, with that comes significant pressure around identity, expectation of others and challenges around safety. To better meet the needs of women and girls across Greater Manchester (GM), policy, practices and […]
22 April 2024

Take a look at our latest videos

Skip to content