Ministers have been told to come up with "creative alternatives" to London's knife crime epidemic - including banning offenders from social media.

The crime rate in the capital has soared in 2018, with Scotland Yard already having logged more than 1,299 knife attacks.

Croydon Central MP Sarah Jones told the Commons that harsher sentences were "simply not working" as she demanded action.

The Labour MP said: "The proportion of people receiving a custodial sentence for knife possession has risen from 40 per cent in 2010 to almost 70 er cent today and yet in the last five years knife crime has been on a sustained and shocking increase, suggesting that harsher sentences are simply not the answer.

"Will the Attorney General look at two things, one some creative alternatives to prison such as electronic tagging or banning young people from social media if they're using it to incite violence.

"Secondly, more ways to reduce reoffending through education and rehabilitation to keep young people out of the prison system."

Solicitor General Robert Buckland told MPs that the Government had made knife crime a "national priority."

He added: "I think it is right that we have approached the issue of possession in a more serious way but I take on board her points about causation."