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Three children have been confirmed dead after a mass stabbing at a dance class in Merseyside, as UK prime minister Sir Keir Starmer visited the area on Tuesday to pay his respects to the victims and their families.
The third victim was a nine-year-old girl, Merseyside police confirmed. The two others, aged six and seven, died on Monday after a teenage boy attacked a Taylor Swift themed dance class at a property on a residential street in Southport north of Liverpool.
Eleven children and two adults were stabbed in the attack. Police said a 17-year-old male from nearby Banks in Lancashire, originally from Cardiff in South Wales, had been arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.
Starmer laid a wreath near the scene of the crime and said the families of the victims must be experiencing “raw pain and grief that most of us can’t imagine”.
He said he did not think anyone in the country was “untouched” by what had happened and thanked emergency service workers for their role in apprehending the suspect and rushing the injured to hospital.
“I really want you to focus on the fact that there are children today alive because of what you did yesterday. That is incredible,” he said on a visit to a local police station.
The attack on Monday was the worst to have targeted children in the UK since 1996 when a 43-year-old man shot dead 16 pupils in a mass shooting at a primary school in Dunblane, Scotland. The Dunblane incident remains the deadliest mass shooting in British history.
Police have said the motives of the Southport attacker, who walked into the property where the dance class was taking place, remained “unclear”.
Serena Kennedy, chief constable of Merseyside police, told a news conference: “The investigation is at its early stages and the motivation for the incident remains unclear.”
“However, counterterrorism police north-west have offered their support to Merseyside police as the full circumstances of what has happened are being established,” she added.
The police said two adults were in a critical condition, having sustained injuries while attempting to defend the children.
Taylor Swift said in a post on Instagram that the horror of the attack was “washing over” her continuously. “These were just little kids at a dance class. I am at a complete loss for how to ever convey my sympathies to these families,” she wrote.
Yvette Cooper, home secretary, who also visited the scene of the crime on Tuesday, warned against “speculating or commenting” on the criminal investigation before updates have been provided by police.