Conservative councillors walked out of a full council meeting and refused to take part in a debate on knife crime.

Labour councillors put forward a motion at Thursday night’s full council meeting to discuss the recent “scourge” of youth knife crime in the area.

Conservatives argued the motion was “desperately one sided.”

Councils are currently operating with restrictions in place before next week’s local election, this time is known as purdah.

Conservatives complained about the timing and wording of the motion to the council’s monitoring officer prior to the meeting.

The monitoring officer disagreed with the Conservatives’ concerns.

The Conservative group had asked for the full council meeting to be moved to a time not affected by purdah, this wasn’t possible.

In protest, the Conservative group voted unanimously to refuse to take part in the debate.

Issues of government cuts to services were raised in the Labour motion. It said: “The Conservative Government’s irresponsible cuts to police and youth services have contributed to a rise in knife crime since 2014, under the previous Mayor of London, Boris Johnson.”

It went on to suggest Waltham Forest Council should “call on the Conservative Government to reconsider their cuts to our police and youth services.”

Leader of the Conservative group, Alan Siggers, said: “We have these rules of purdah for a reason. [The motion] was at best premature, at worst it was pointless.

“This debate will be had, but at a time when we can do something about it.”

He added: “Why wouldn’t you get schools involved, why wouldn’t you get social services involved? There needs to be a multi-disciplinary, cross-party solution, maybe even with other boroughs.

“This is not just a Waltham Forest issue, it’s a national issue.”

On Facebook, John Moss, Conservative councillor for Larkswood, wrote: “In July 2017 Labour Councillors rejected a Conservative motion asking them to get our Safer Neighbourhood Board to do its job and secure funding available to reduce crime.

“Labour Councillors voted down our motion.

“We weren’t going to participate in a party political broadcast tonight on behalf of the Labour Party. They have no credibility here, because they failed to act nine months ago and perhaps had they, some young lives may not have been lost.”

Labour Cllr Grace Williams proposed the motion.

She said: “Tragically there have been a series of serious incidents in our borough. In response, last Thursday at our Full Council meeting we chose to discuss the important issue of rising youth violence in our borough and across London.

“The Waltham Forest Conservatives chose to walk out of a Full Council meeting in the Chamber and their reason for this still remains unclear.

“By actively choosing not to participate in this extremely important discussion, they have shown that they are not interested in putting party politics aside in order to protect our young people, whilst we are focused on keeping the young people in our borough safe.

“Whilst we are in Purdah, the world does not stand still. Council business can and must continue as usual and it is important to note that we are not alone in holding council meetings during this period.

“Throughout London, most council’s hold meetings and these include Conservative-led councils such as Westminster, Kingston and Bexley”.