More knife bins are being set up in Essex as part of an ongoing amnesty appeal.

The charity Only Cowards Carry launched its first set of bins in Colchester and the Tendring/Clacton area in January.

Now more collection points will be set up in Braintree, outside the police station, Chelmsford and Uttlesford.

It is part of a campaign to stop young people carrying knives and warn them of the dangers of knife crime.

The bins, which will be on the streets from around 10am today, are donated by The British Ironwork Centre which is collecting the knives given in to make a large sculpture of an angel to be placed as a symbol of hope and awareness of knife crime.

The bin in Clacton collected around 300 blades in just three months when it was launched after a successful trial period last year.

One of the people behind Only Cowards Carry is Caroline Shearer, whose son Jay Whiston was stabbed to death at a party in Colchester in 2012.

Earlier this year she said the effects of knife crime had to be put on the national curriculum like sex education.

It came after a Freedom of Information request showed in Suffolk children as young as 10 had been found with knives in their possession when arrested by police between November 2011 and November 2014.