Sophie Willett, of The Howard League for Penal Reform, reports on public attitudes to crime and punishment and the need for more evidenced based policies to reduce crime.
Sophie Willett, of The Howard League for Penal Reform, reports on public attitudes to crime and punishment and the need for more evidenced based policies to reduce crime.
The Times’ poll (£) into public attitudes on crime and punishment has found the public worried that sentences are too short and they blame the lack of deterrent as the principal reason for their fears over crime.
The timing of this poll is important; at this moment the prison population is teetering on the brink of a record high. Never before have we sent more people to prison; 126,000 men women and children last year alone. Consecutive governments boast about locking up more of their citizens in prison than ever before; a badge of honour for being the tough guy of politics.
But this tired rhetoric has failed to engage with the common man. After 20 years of being tough on crime, at a cost running into billions of pounds for the taxpayer, people still aren’t happy. Three quarters of those polled say that the coalition is no tougher than the previous government.
The reality is that sentences have got steadily longer over the past 10 years. The average time served of those on determinate sentences has increased by 14 per cent since 2000 and we now jail more people on life and other indeterminate sentences than the rest of Western Europe combined. Sending ever increasing numbers of people to prison does not work. People are still fearful of crime. So maybe it’s time to look beyond the Mitchell brothers’ school of tough politics.
Now is the time to focus not what is tough, but what is effective. If given a choice between a punishment that will reduce the chances of somebody going out and doing the same thing to someone else, or a punishment that will encourage it, I know what I’d pick. It doesn’t really matter what the remedy is, as long as it works.
Ever increasing prison populations are a sign of failure, not success. In recognising that the criminal justice system is a blunt tool, and that lasting solutions to crime lie outside the confines of the prison cell, the government is taking a major step towards meaningful reform that will shape the way we respond to crime in the 21st century. I just hope they rely on empirical evidence on reducing crime to inform public opinion, and not the other way round.
23 Responses to “Progressives should rally around coalition’s better instincts on prison reform”
Anon E Mouse
Tara Majumdar – Now you’ve got me.
I agree absolutely with the sentiment in your post. There is a huge difference between a crime against the person – anything violent and what I would describe as “corporate crime”.
Pedophiles I would only let out with either chemical castration or after they are no longer sexually capable to inflict their perverted crimes against children (My partner is a child protection social worker so I am aware of the mindset of these horrible people).
Rape and murder I would categorise to allow different types like the in the US, so a woman who has lived a life of misery at the hands of a violent husband and eventually lashes out and accidentally kills him should not be treated the same Ian Huntley or Fred West.
Benefit cheats I would fine them and the mother shoplifting to feed her child should also be treated differently from a burglar who has invaded someone’s home and stolen their property.
Your final part regarding scaling up the punishment I agree with whole heartedly and just wish these types of groups like the Howard League could act intelligently with the system to cater for the victims who without exception will always get my sympathy before criminals.
Tara Majumdar
Ok then, we agree that there is a real difference between the pedophiles and the benefit cheats and how they should be treated by the criminal justice system.
As you said, benefit cheats should be getting fines and not be clogging up our prisons with their paltry sentences, which often amount to no more than some weeks or a few months. It is also unlikely that any meaningful rehabilitative programmes can be provided to them during this period. Pedophiles, on the other end of the spectrum, we both agree should be in prison although we differ in what punishment they should be given whilst in there.
You also make a distinction between the mother shoplifting to feed her child and the burglar who breaks into someone’s house to steal their property. Not wanting to complicate the examples anymore than we have done, what do you do if both the mother and the burglar are drug addicts? At the moment, there’s quite a high statistical chance they are.
Do you make sure they come off the drugs so they don’t shoplift and burgle anymore? Do they both deserve to come off the drugs in prison or in the community with proper supervision? Should we save our prison places for the more serious offenders, the one’s that we’re really scared about and not the ones that are just a nuisance?
I also think that victims should have more of a voice in our criminal justice system. Right now, it’s very much about either the victim or the offender winning or losing and the only way the victim can contribute is by voicing their opinion (which no one is obliged to listen to) that the offender should be sentenced for longer. Having been a victim, I’d rather know that they’re not going to do it again and for the offender to realise the impact they have had on the victim. That’s why at least advocating restorative justice seems like a good move to me.
Anon E Mouse
Tara Majumdar – On the pedophile I’m afraid for me there is not way back – children are too venerable to be put at risk. The law needs to be finessed – a 16 year old engaging in sexual activity (I know about legal consent) with a 15 year old is not the sort of example I would cite.
This despicable 53 year old individual here: http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/2011/03/12/orphanage-man-jailed-91466-28322774/
set up a children’s orphanage to abuse children and only got two years.
Drug misuse should not be an excuse for crime and too often it is. I worked for years with a guy who was a heroin addict and he injected into his foot nightly yet never once missed a single shift at work. I know several people who smoke cannabis regularly and two who snort cocaine socially.
None of these people commits crime to feed their habit and to me it is simply an excuse for bad behaviour.
I’d lock them up to go cold turkey – no drugs or methadone in prison as far as I’m concerned and unlike the current system anyone leaving prison would definitely be drug free as they walked through the gates to freedom.
Restorative Justice and the like are simply tactics and I am more interested in strategies to prevent people becoming victims but from what you have posted so far Tara I think you should be working for these people because you seem very knowledgable on this subject!