Legal News
Harsher Community Sentencing Encouraged To Prevent Persistent Offending (13 September 2011)
Date: 13/09/2011
Stricter community sentences are required to prevent persistent low-level offending, experts claim. Intensive periods of community service can often be harder when compared to a short-term prison spell but the sentences must adhere to "the necessary standards of rigour" in order for them to be effective, according to a report by Make Justice Work. The report comes as the prison population reached an all-time high in England and Wales.
Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke has recently announced his plans for a "rehabilitation revolution" that is designed to reduce reoffending. Three in five offenders who receive a prison sentence of less than 12 months are currently reconvicted within one year of their release yet the “Community Or Custody” report warns that corners cannot be cut when implementing the rehabilitation revolution. Community sentences are considered to play a crucial role in both meeting the public and the victims' expectations of effective justice. They also prove more cost-effective. Mr. Clarke claims that intensive community sentences must adhere to the required standards of rigour and effectiveness and the public must clearly understand what they are and why they can have confidence in them. In order to adhere to these standards, considerable upfront investment is likely to be required.
The report was produced as a result of a study headed by a panel comprising of Sir Ian Blair, the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Dame Anne Owers, the former Chief Inspector of Prisons, and John Thornhill, the Magistrates' Association’s chairman.
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