00:00 Ronan Kanda, young local lad, was killed just outside his house, just up the road here.
00:08 And this is mum, Ronan's mum Pooja and his sister Nikita. Since Ronan was killed,
00:16 Pooja, Nikita, the whole family have done a huge amount of campaign against knife crime.
00:25 We've worked very closely together, being in parliament, meetings with ministers, shadow
00:33 ministers, trying to get the law toughened up against buying these weapons online, trying to
00:42 stop other families having to go through what the Kanda family have gone through and what they have
00:50 to live with every day. And as well as the campaign, Pooja spoke to me quite early on
00:56 about the desire to have a bench in Ronan's memory in the local area.
01:03 That's what we're here to do, to unveil this bench. And it's really important that this bench is here
01:15 because it will serve as a permanent reminder for Ronan's family, for anyone in the local area who
01:23 wants to take a moment to pause, to sit down and reflect. It's an emotional day for you today
01:32 with the unveiling of this bench. What does it mean to you to see this symbol?
01:39 It means that he did exist. It means that he was here. It means a lot that my child
01:48 is valued. His life was valued. Even though he's not here today, his life,
01:59 the way he passed away, is brutal and painful. Yet, people have come together to do this for
02:11 my son. So it means everything to me right now. Honestly, it means everything. With his name on
02:18 this plaque, with him, his favourite thing, "You will never walk alone." I don't want him to walk
02:24 alone for wherever he is. He knows that whole communities come together for him.
02:30 And you spoke earlier of the whole community using this bench as to sit down for a moment,
02:38 thought, if they need to. That's quite nice for the community to be able to do that.
02:43 Yes. He played in this park when he was younger. When he was a baby, I used to bring him in this
02:50 park. Little did I know that I would be getting a bench on his name. But you know, I hope the
02:59 people in the community and all the youths can come and sit down and feel, if they ever need,
03:06 to reconsider their thoughts. This is the place. This is to see what a beautiful person lost his
03:17 life because of the knife crime. He had no participation in it.
03:22 Yeah. And just going forward with the Justice for Ronan campaign, we've heard from Pat McFadden,
03:28 we've heard from the local councillor, Harjinder Singh, supporting your campaign. How is that
03:36 going and what do you want to see happen in the next few months?
03:39 I would like to see that if the government step up and put the ban on all related articles online
03:48 sale because that's how the murder of my child was able to obtain through online sale. And
03:56 with Pat's help and the Shadow Minister's help, I hope that we can put this across to the Prime
04:05 Minister that what's happening out here, he needs to see what is wrong with the society and he needs
04:11 to correct it because he's got that power. And I don't know the political ways of how these things
04:19 are dealt with, but I'm a mum who's lost her son's life and that's how I see it. And there's other
04:25 families out there who are losing their children. And I think all the families are losing their
04:30 kids like this. There is no need because of, we have to get strong and hard on these type of
04:38 crimes. And certainly I feel the government needs to do more than they are doing right now.
04:43 And of course, at the Express and Star, we support you fully with our campaign as well.
04:48 Just the people gathered here today, there's been a lot of efforts, a lot of red tape cut through to
04:55 bring this symbol. What would you want to say to them?
04:58 Absolutely grateful. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I never thought that,
05:06 you know, after what happened to my son, I lost so much trust in humanity, in humans. But this
05:14 is the restoration of that trust. This is giving a child, an innocent child, a name
05:23 in a society that we're living right now. So I'm grateful for every individual who has come
05:29 to put this together. Pat, Pat McFadden and Frank and the two gentlemen who paid for all this as
05:39 well. Thank you so, so much from the bottom of my heart. I cannot thank you enough. And thank
05:45 you for restoring my trust in humanity that I have lost. I hope there is much more humanity
05:52 left out there and together we can do all that this other bench happening, not the park.
05:58 We should do happy memories. And this is actually a happy memory for me because my son is a happy
06:05 memory.
06:11 [BLANK_AUDIO]
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