SAMURAI swords could be banned under a Government review.

York MP Hugh Bayley asked Ministers to look at outlawing the lethal weapons, which have been used in several violent incidents in the city.

Now Home Office Minister Hazel Blears has revealed the Government is investigating which weapons commonly used by criminals should be added to its list of banned items.

Mr Bayley urged the Government to take action after the conviction of Daniel Rocks in January for chasing three people around the streets of Clifton with a samurai sword.

This followed his calls for a ban last year, after a neighbours' dispute in which two thugs, Stephen Hammond and John O'Callaghan, viciously attacked a man with a sword.

It is already an offence to carry a knife or samurai sword in a public place, and the weapons cannot be sold to anyone under 16.

But Mr Bayley urged the Government to ban samurai swords altogether, saying "they are not ornaments but dangerous weapons" which should be "controlled in the same way as guns".

Rocks was jailed for two years after threatening his neighbours he would "cut them up like mice" over complaints they were playing music too loud.

Hammond was jailed for seven years and O'Callaghan was sentenced to eight years after they struck victim Steven Johnson on the head, sliced his arm open to the bone and cut his face several times with an ornamental sword in Kingsway West.

The attack was carried out in revenge for an argument Hammond's daughter was having with the victim.

Mr Bayley said: "I am appalled that two unrelated samurai sword attacks have already taken place in York.

"Samurai swords are a very nasty and vicious type of knife. They are lethal weapons and there are currently no restrictions on their trade.

"The Minister has said that she shares my concerns about the misuse of samurai swords, and I am glad she is looking seriously at adding samurai swords to the list of weapons already banned."

Ms Blears said: "I am currently considering whether there are weapons now being used in crime which have little or no legitimate purpose and should be added to the list of banned offensive weapons.

"I am looking seriously at adding samurai swords to this list."

Other incidents in the area include a Selby man chased by a jealous attacker wielding a sword, a York College student who waved a sword at a driver, and a three-hour siege in Tang Hall involving a man with a sword.

Nick Willard, marketing manager at The Japanese Shop, York, said: "Some of our British swords are used in crime in the same way - so why stop at just samurai swords? We sell samurai swords which are solely made for display, which means they cannot be sharpened up because they are not made of the same steel.

"To buy a real Japanese samurai sword would cost thousands of pounds. But I suppose there may be an issue about people using replica swords in the same way as they use replica handguns.

"If the law was changed we would abide by it, but the Government should look closely at exactly what it wants to ban."

Laura Ferguson, of the Whigmaleeries antique shop in Stonegate, said: "We do sell them and a lot of people buy them as ornaments, so yes, it would affect trade.

"But the swords we sell are made from a different metal than real samurai swords, and they are blunted so can't be used. If you tried to fight with them, they would just break."

Updated: 09:34 Friday, March 24, 2006