NEW laws to clamp down on violent online content were mooted today as the government began to lay out its response to last July’s murders of three young girls in Southport.

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper announced an inquiry into all circumstances behind the crime and said it was a “total disgrace” that the killer had been able to buy a knife on Amazon, despite being a 17-year-old with a prior conviction for violence.

Axel Rudakubana’s decision to plead guilty to all the charges he faces allows the government to politically address the crime, which gave the pretext for far-right riots in many towns, without fear of prejudicing court proceedings.

Mr Rudakubana will be sentenced on Thursday for the murders and other offences, including possession of the poison ricin and an al-Qaida training manual.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer acknowledged that the killer had been referred to the controversial Prevent programme three times, as well as various other government agencies, whose shortcomings amounted to a “state failure,” the main focus of the inquiry.

He also announced that the law would be changed so lone killers with “extreme individualised violence” will in future be charged as terrorists.

“We also see acts of extreme violence perpetrated by loners, misfits, young men in their bedroom, accessing all manner of material online, desperate for notoriety, sometimes inspired by traditional terrorist groups, but fixated on that extreme violence, seemingly for its own sake,” he said.

Mr Rudakubana’s apparent lack of any ideological motivation had initially led the authorities not to describe his actions as terrorist. 

Independent MP Shockat Adam questioned whether the fixation on ideology shown in William Shawcross’s review of Prevent under the Tory government had led to Mr Rudakubana not being treated as a threat.

Ms Cooper acknowledged that social media was straining long-standing laws around contempt of court and told the Commons: “Tech companies should not be profiting from hosting content that puts children’s lives at risk.”

Some Tories tried to make hay with insinuations that the government had known about the risks posed by Mr Rudakubana earlier than it was letting on, and that this had stirred up the far-right rioters. 

But Sir Keir said that revealing more would have risked the collapse of the trial and justice going undone.

Mr Rudakubana was known to police, as well as child and adolescent mental health services, and had a conviction for violence against another pupil at school.

Bebe King, aged six, Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, were his three victims.