Crime and Punishment
Some time ago in my “5 reasons to be optimistic…” blog I suggested that it was possible that there might be some elements of the con-dem agenda that we would (whisper it) actually be quite pleased with on the left.
Not the economic class warfare on the poor that the con-dems are engaging in, nor the attempt to deconstruct universal education, nor for that matter most of their public policy agenda. But where they do seem to have stolen a march is in terms of the Liberty agenda.
I agree whole heartedly with Diane Abbott when she wonders, in exasperation, how we ever let the Tories be to the left of us on civil liberties.
Prison
So therefore I had mixed emotions last week when listening to Ken Clarke’s speech about penal policy. These emotions were mixed because I found myself agreeing with most of what he had to say, and then tearing my hair out at Jack Straws response.
Basically Clarke made a break away from the Michael Howard “Prison Works” dogma which has driven penal and criminal justice policy in the UK since the early 90s. Clarke noted that the current levels of incarceration in prison today would have seemed unbelievable in the early 90s, and further that most European countries have proportionately lower prison populations and lower crime.
I doubt that the Tories have undergone any particular Damascene conversion to a more thoughtful and progressive policy of Criminal Justice. I rather suspect that when Clark lambasted Labour for “Conducting policy with a chequebook in one hand and the Daily Mail in the other” the emphasis was very much on the former.
Despite this, the policy here offers a real prospect of a public policy change for the better. Labour have been locked into a destructive arms race that we can *never* win on Criminal Justice. It does not matter what we do, how hard, how illiberal, how shrill we are it will never satisfy the Mail, the Express or Disgusted form Tonbridge Wells.
Instead we now have an opportunity to argue for a more sensible and evidence Criminal Justice Policy. One that recognises that the causes of crime are varied, and that being “tough on the causes” of crime does not mean just banging more people up.
Maybe we can argue for a more sensible drugs policy? Or at the very least properly funded treatment for addicts. Perhaps we could be looking at things like restorative justice, which has been shown to have a significant impact on the recidivism of offenders.
But mostly this con-dem switch will allow us to maybe position ourselves on the side of the Angels again. The Labour Party could just try to score some cheap political points in the face of this as Jack Straw has tried to do. If we do this we are missing one of the tricks in respect of why Labour lost the election.
It would be better, and more progressive if we tried to be positive and dream of a good society. One in which we do not have the highest prison population in Europe, and in which we look to genuinely reduce crime, rather than just react to it.
