UK PM Rishi Sunak speaks of daughters as motivation for safer streets

London: British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has spoken of his worry as a parent for his daughters, which is a key motivation behind his determination to crack down on crime and make the country’s streets safer.

The father of 11-year-old Krishna and nine-year-old Anoushka told reporters on the way to the G20 Summit in Bali last weekend that the issue of safety of women is personally important to him.

The British Indian leader, who is married to Infosys co-founder Narayan Murthy’s daughter Akshata, referenced some recent incidents of attacks on women and girls in the UK to highlight that the issue was a priority for him.

"I want to make sure that my kids and everyone else can walk around safely; that's what any parent wants for their children," said Sunak, as he admitted that "many of us men" take safety "for granted".

"So, tackling that and making it safer for people is something that's just personally quite important to me," he said.

According to a BBC report on Saturday, Sunak shared how Krishna had wanted to walk to her primary school in London by herself when she turned 11, which was the reason why his family had previously moved out of their 11 Downing Street flat earlier this year and closer to her school before he resigned as chancellor in July.

They have since moved back into the 10 Downing Street flat after he took office as Prime Minister last month.

Asked about life back at Downing Street, he said moving back into the flat the family lived in when he was chancellor above No 10 had made the transition "easier than it otherwise might have been".

On tackling crime, Sunak said people in disadvantaged backgrounds were more likely to be affected by crime and he wanted to "deliver for those people" by putting more police officers on the street.

Pushed on whether the number of people in prison should be higher, Sunak said this was a "logical consequence of catching more criminals" and the government was building 10,000 more prison places over the next few years.

He said he was not particularly comfortable with prison numbers going up, but the funding was in place to have the capacity to do it.