The Prison Paradox

Thirty years ago, the prison population was half what it is now. My perception of crime is that I don’t feel any more threatened than I did at that time.

So we have a phone-in where everyone is going on about being hard on criminals, when the rise of the prison population is showing that it is not a deterrent.

But then no-one really publishes the prison statistics properly, so we don’t know what everybody is locked up for. Is it 90% for burglary, theft and violence or just 20%? Whatever it is makes a hell of a lot of difference to how you treat prisoners.

We need a proper debate based on the actual statistics, not an emotional fight between the hangers and floggers and the liberals.