I’m sick to the back teeth of listening to every reason under the sun why certain criminals can’t be put behind bars, why their case is an exception to the rule or how their protected characteristics mean they should avoid prison.
So when the Sentencing Council’s new guidelines dropped last week – formalising a regime whereby people will be given lighter sentences simply on the basis of their ethnicity and gender – it confirmed that, under this government, lefty, out-of-touch human rights lawyers are having the biggest say with no regard at all paid to the overwhelming majority of the public who are crying out for a tougher sentencing regime.
Keir Starmer – a human rights lawyer himself – already presiding over a two-tier policing system is now overseeing a two-tier justice system as well, where white, male Christians will feel the full weight of the law, whilst ethnic minority women will be given get-out-of-jail-free cards.
Criminal gangs are, in effect, being told who to groom and recruit so they can continue their spree uninterrupted, and let’s not forget we also have a Labour Minister for Prisons who thinks two-thirds of prisoners shouldn’t be behind bars.
I studied law at university and was told that the fundamental principle of our justice system was that everyone was equal before the law. What on earth ever happened to that?
To be honest, the judiciary has been incrementally going down this path for a while. For every category of offence, a man is more likely to be sent to prison than a woman – with women often being spared prison for no other reason than that they are female.
There are some campaigners who believe no women should ever be sent to prison while others think no pregnant women should be jailed – even though we already see women getting pregnant deliberately between conviction and sentencing in order to avoid jail.
The sisterhood is always crying out for equality, just not when it comes to sentencing!
It’s time that the Government woke up to the fact that the public doesn’t want handwringing, wet-as-lettuce judges, nor do they want them pussyfooting around those who break the law and wish the rest of us harm.
Take the incident over the weekend when a pro-Palestinian protester managed to scale Elizabeth Tower and spent more than 16 hours perched on a ledge next to Big Ben causing mayhem across London.
How on earth did he get there? And why did we see fleets of ambulances, fire engines and police cars full of people sitting looking up at him for hours on end?
The first priority of the state is to protect its people. It is failing in that basic task and the patience of the British people is wearing very thin.
