“Law and Order” is an issue on which everyone has a view. Dreadful crimes demand tough sentences. Personally I always prefer judges to be given some discretion to decide case by case as to exact sentances rather than Parliament dictating minimum tarriffs for every crime – but the public are right to expect that those who offend are punished.
Happily however the hideous punishments once associated with the old Horsham gaol are long gone. The way we treat prisoners is constantly evolving. I beleive that just as in the same way we now recognise that the best deterent to any crime is a good prospect of being caught, we have a right to demand of our justice system that it will do everything possible to ensure that offenders’ most recent sentence is their last. For far too long we have accepted dreadful rates of reoffending, as many as 100,000 crimes are committed each year by reoffenders: behind these figures are lost opportunities to transform lives.
I have been pursuing this in questions to the justice department. I am pleased that from April, offenders will be tested on their Maths and English and their progress towards employment. Results will be published to enable us to track improvements across the prison estate – to ensure help is being provided and best practice spread.
Success will depend on our dedicated prison officers, the Government is investing over £100m and putting in place an additional 2,500 more officers to resource reform. There are people from all walks of life who would make great prison officers but I have asked for the service actively to target graduates among them – they have and I am pleased to say they received 1,000 expressions of interest in the first 24 hours.
There are some fantastic educational programmes in specific prisons but this has to become the norm. Being given the space to learn and a sense of purpose in prison improves behaviour and conditions behind bars. Critically it also reduces reoffending rates on release. Prisoners are there because of their actions – but ensuring those actions are not repeated is in everyone’s interest.
Photo caption: With Police and Crime Commissioner Katy Bourne in the Carfax after a meeting to discuss local policing issues.