Leader - Prison is the only answer to crime
In the war on crime, Shropshire has suffered a heavy defeat in the past few months as burglars have got the upper hand.
In the war on crime, Shropshire has suffered a heavy defeat in the past few months as burglars have got the upper hand.
In the three months up to June, there were 417 house burglaries, compared to just 254 last year, bringing all the misery and distress to householders which is part and parcel of this despicable crime with its traumatic invasion of privacy.
It is sickening that the crooks are laughing in the face of justice because their chances of getting caught and brought to book are depressingly low.
They prey on the most vulnerable in society, leaving them fearful in their own homes. According to police, a factor behind the big rise is that crooks are coming from outside Shropshire because they think the county offers easy pickings.
Time then to give the burglars cause to have second thoughts.
If they are caught, they know that the courts, mindful of prison overcrowding and budgetary restrictions, will administer little more than a slap on the wrist.
What this country wants is not more traffic lights, more snooping on law-abiding citizens and more foreign aid to countries richer than ours, but a Government which looks after its citizens.
And if it wants to provide some sort of economic stimulus, why not build more prisons? Not only do they create both short and long term employment, their building will send a message to the criminals that the days of kidglove treatment are over, and banging up the offenders gives citizens a much-needed break from their evil activities.
If only the Government had the backbone to back up the tough-talking headline-grabbing rhetoric with something that actually works.
And one of the most commonsense things that was ever said by a politician was: Prison works.
Comments for: "Leader - Prison is the only answer to crime"
Mike
I'm really not sure if I agree with you here. While protecting people's property is an important objective building more prisons shouldn't be the answer.
It's incredibly expensive to throw people in jail, the state has to feed them, cloth them and supervise them all for no real gain.
I'd like to see a work initiative instead, community style service providing low cost labour for our farms or woodlands. At least that way the county would benefit from it and the offenders may learn some skills other than shanking and showering with their backs against a wall.
Roger
I agree we should impose community service orders. We have plenty of problems which the politicians say they have no answer to. Care of the Elderly supporting them in their own homes by gardening and decorating and just being there, road repairing, care of parklands and public areas, road cleaning etc. are all available.
More important is the treatment of white collar crime, fraud, tax evasion, criminal dealing in the banks, police corruption, political corruption etc. If a girl caught up in the riots took a 50p bottle of water from a previously looted shop got 6 months what terms should the white collar criminals get?
We need to be stricter on the big crimes and more balanced on the petty crimes. It is often the record that is the worst punishment because it inhibits employment for long periods when these are the very people who need to get job to keep themselves and their families. I think that a whole range of petty crime should be punished with some form of payback punishment and then rehabilitated. Drug user related crimes could be dealt with by detoxification and testing for a period after, failure means re sentencing.
All of these options should be available instead of fines for those who have no income instead of wasting years of administration trying to get payment.
Burglary is growing because poverty is growing and the police are ineffective in detecting criminals. Punishments for Burglary are available and there would be plenty of room in jail if we dealt with the petty offenders better.
Simon
Brilliant piece and totally correct, punish the criminals and leave the ordinary hard working people alone. Well said.
Andy H
What a stereotypical knee jerk reaction. Prison isn't the only answer, its just one weapon in the war against crime and in my view, should be a last resort. As Mike above mentions, it is an expensive option and I personally don't want to pay to feed and house these criminals. Added to that, the rate of recidivism is high so the success of this option has already proven to be low. If we want further argument against building more prisons, just look to the USA which already locks up a high proportion of its population with little discernible success even where the three strikes rule applies.
What we need is a strong economy where hard work is rewarded and people have a hope for their future. Those who break the rules should have to work to repair the damage to society that they have done and also be given assistance to address the cause of their criminal actions.
What I'm suggesting isn't an easy option and perhaps requires the Bang 'em Up! brigade to think a little deeper.
H. St. John Peasbody
Prison does not work else why do we see massive repeat offending?
The choices as I see them are either:
1. The re-introduction of corporal and/or capital punishment.
2. More community-based punishments and rehabilitation.
Point 1 will never happen so let's do more work on point 2: Community-based punishments (real punishments that make convicted criminals work hard to repay the community that they've wronged) and rehabilitation. Without rehabilitation, punishment (corporal, community or penal) is a total waste of time.
We also need to look at the causes of crime. So much crime is caused by addiction to drugs and/or alcohol. This newspaper has scoffed at rehabilitation ideas (gym passes) for drugs users and I think that you are totally wrong. Getting people off drugs is the key.
R Suppards
No convicted prisoner should have a level of comfort, equipment or food which is better than the lowest such experienced by a law abiding citizen, particularly a pensioner.
Yes, prison should work - but in the literal sense. Eight hours a day on tasks benefiting the country - there must be lots of rocks need breaking, and despite the onslaught of email there must still be a need for mailbags.
H. St. John Peasbody
Pensioners are the wealthiest sector in society.
Peter
There are two problems with your approach. Firstly, the cost. If we put people in prison, it costs us tens of thousands of pounds per year - I don't know about you, but I don't want to pay £40k per year for someone to break rocks, especially as there's no evidence that it will stop them re-offending.
Secondly, and as Peasbody suggests, it would be far better and cheaper to have them working in the community - but at a time when the economy is shrinking and more and more are being either put out of work or forced into poverty pay, should we be further undermining the lot of the working poor and the unemployed by giving work to prisoners instead?
The second of Peasbody's suggestions is, however, a good one. Why not spend the tens of thousands we spend on keeping each individual locked up on rehabilitation instead? Given the proven high link between drug and alcohol addiction and petty recidivist crime that would seem to be the best way of reducing burglary.
But I do accept that such an approach wouldn't make for Daily Mail-style rants masquerading as 'leader' articles...
Doubter
"Riot" steal a bottle of water that costs £.058p 12 months prison.
Run a bank, commit fraud for £millions walk away expecting £millions as settlement.
Brian
Prison isn't a deterant because the sentences are too short and the regime is too soft. Mamby pambying to prisoners religious beliefs and food needs etc.
Prison should mean 16hrs a day hard labor. Visits should be infrequent and the prisoner and visitors should be separated by screens or walls thereby making the passing of drugs and mobile phone almost impossible
H. St. John Peasbody
I appreciate your stance and am in agreement with parts of it. However, it cannot be acceptable to make a Jewish prisoner eat pork products or a Hindu eat beef regardless of the crimes that they have committed.
Also, how do you know that prison regimes are too soft? When were you last incarcerated and for how long?
JOHN JONES
St. John, " it cannot be acceptable for a Jewish prisoner to eat pork products or a Hindu to eat beef." If you don't like the food, starve, or better still don't do the crime, after-all they are all volunteers. I can speak with authority that they are soft.
Peter
Brian,
Are you suggesting that Christian prisoners shouldn't be allowed to attend church services on a Sunday? Or forbidden from reading the Bible.
Are you suggesting orthodox Jews should be made to work on their Sabbath?
Or is this just a thinly-disguised attack on certain other religions based upon your own prejudices?
sordid
If that's the case, why aren't all these corrupts mp's and bankers locked up?
Katherine de Gama
What utter nonsense. How does the leader writer account for recidivism?Prison doesn't work, except for people who are so dangerous they need to be kept away from the rest of us. Btw, since moving to Shrewsbury I have been burgled five times. It wasn't traumatic and I'm not scared although I'm often alone. I think we could do with some better copy.
Stephen Bunting
"Prison works" may have gone down a storm with the Tory faithful, but the truth as I see it is "prison makes a good man bad and a bad man worse".