Plymouth is a tight-knit community. People often say it’s like a big village. You don’t expect shootings in our city, let alone a mass shooting.
A mass shooting that sees a little child killed is unbelievable. At least until it happened to us.
Keyham is a proud community with a big heart. People live nearby to their families, and people know their neighbours here.
It’s a place where people look out for one another. It’s how all our communities should be.
There are many questions that our community deserve answers to. How did this happen? Why did this happen?
The answers won’t be easy and they won’t come quickly, but our community deserves the proper answers.
We don’t need quick ones that satisfy a 24-hour media, but we do need ones that are accurate and honest.
Since the shooting happened I’ve spoken to dozens and dozens of local people. All of them aghast and shocked. This mass shooting has shaken our communities to the core.
With the naming of the gunman there are rightly questions about how he was so radicalised to believe shooting people was his only course of action. But in asking those difficult questions about how he got to such a horrid place, let’s not forget the victims.
My heart and our nation’s hearts goes out to those who lost loved ones, those who were injured and those who will live with the images of the shooting on their street for years to come.
Our community is a strong one here and because we are strong we will get through this. We will do it together.
In the coming days our focus will be on the community, and looking after each other. The police need space to investigate. They should leave no stone left unturned and every rotten avenue on social media unexplored.
The questions about angry young men, gun laws and online radicalisation should happen. But for today, let’s keep a focus on the victims, their families and our community.
The gunman has robbed us of precious lives and it is them we should remember.
And in their memory we must make sure that this never, ever happens again.
