Audio of Ken Clarke's rape comments

Sally Chatterjee

What a non-story. If anything it's the breathless and inane Victoria Derbyshire who should apologise. Rather than probing questions she is clearly trying to generate a polemic debate. Public service broadcasters must do better, this is not Talksport.

lids

The man is a liability and should be kept indoors, well out of sight of members of the public or more importantly victims of crime, especially the crime of rape.

What an embarrassment. Calls himself a Conservative? Lord knows why, something to do with arrogance??

Helen

I disagree with the policy and I think Mr Clarke is out of touch with what rape victims want - which is to see their attackers locked away for as long as possible.

But he is *not* trivialising rape, but simply trying to explain how (in his view) the figure of an average sentence length of 5 years is arrived at. He is not trivialising rape by pointing out that "rape" in the legal sense is a catch-all phrase which includes consensual sex below the age of consent, for example, and that it is misleading to include the light sentences given for offenses like that in the 5 year average.

All he's trying to do is explain that he thinks violent rape gets much higher average sentences, so his policy suggestion would (in his view) not lead to violent offenders getting out after 15 months.

I have no idea if his math is right - and the phone call of the victim suggests it isn't, because her violent attacker was only facing 6 years before he pleaded and got a third off.

BUT I am disturbed by the moral panic a few out-of-context soundbites are producing. It discredits left-wing critics and distracts from the real issue, namely that it's wrong to let violent offenders out of prison early just for admitting what they've done.

Torontory

I have just completed listening to the whole discussion between Victoria Derbyshire and Ken Clarke. The actual comments he made seem to differ substantially from the interpretation being placed on them with the opportunist agenda. I heard nothing to suggest that he should be resigning.

Victoria Derbyshire's interviewing approach was just awful: not listening, making the same point again and again without considering what KC had said, etc.

Maybe the BBC should be considering her position.

Victoria Derbyshire's interviewing appraoch was just awful: not listening, making the same point again and agian without considering what KC had said, etc.

Maybe the BBC should be considering her position.

A Rand

He seems very old now and a bit confused. Shame

Torontory

Apologies for the PC gremlin in my previous comment!

Nicholas Hallam

Leaving aside the question of whether the length of the sentences is appropriate, he is clearly correct to distinguish between serious and less serious instances of rape, and brave to do so in the company he found himself in.

Pettros

Its just blunder followed by blunder with this mob.

Tron

Victoria Derbyshire starts every Conservative interview with the attitude 'I'm gonna nail this Tory bastard because I grew up in the North of England and have hated Thatcher and her Nasty Party all my life.' Listen to her with a Labour MP if you think I exaggerate.
If all rapes were the same they would all have the same sentence. She knows this but thought she could get Clarke on the 'good rape, bad rape' rap. Labour and the BBC are on a roll, don't let the facts get in the way.
If Ken wants to halve a sentence he should double it first.

Nicholas

Poor old Ken - trial by media. I wonder if he pleads guilty to misogyny and being a politically un-corrected dinosaur we might be spared 50% of the media feeding frenzy?

Of course the hysteria over rape (as opposed to other equally horrible crimes) has nothing to do with the pervasive political wing of feminism (what is the male equivalent of "feminism" by the way?). The sisters outrage and spiteful misandry that any male accused of rape should ever be acquitted is somewhat undermined by the very long and packed history of malicious and false complaints which have ruined the lives of so many. Still, as a society we are ever elevating the opportunities for grievance-motivated malicious complaints to new heights with the pre-trial presumption of accuser-truth and accused-guilt. Truly emotion replaces reason on this one and there are far more p-whipped "new men" around these days to wring their hands and submit to the sisters increasingly strident demands for the abandonment of rational thought for gossip, faux outrage and an obsession with shoes.

Archibald

As someone who has seen their family utterly destroyed by rape, I was disgusted by the behaviour of Ed Miliband in todayâ™s PMQs.
I was listening to the interview with Ken Clarke earlier, and while he stumbled over words it was perfectly clear the point he was making, and while I may disagree with much of what he has to say on sentencing, to twist and misrepresent his words in an attempt to score political points on such as serious issue is nothing short of a disgrace, and it does a huge disservice to victims and their families.
It underlines for me the complete failure of the system of politics in the UK on any issue, where party point scoring continually overshadows proper debate. Itâ™s unfortunate that Labour have chosen to do this with such a sensitive issue, but it is increasingly apparent on so many issues that the main parties would rather see each other fail than have an adult debate that actually benefits the country.

oldtimer

I too have now listened to the whole interview. It sounded to me that Clarke described the sentencing rules (administered by judges) very clearly. His replies were not helped by the interruptions of the interviewer (in typical BBC style). The attempt by MilibandE at PMQs to whip this up into a resignation issue is absurd. The harrowing case described by the lady who phoned in appears to have occurred on New Labours watch, the very time when it was supposed to be "tough on crime".

Del

Silly Milli should be ashamed and the Media should be out to prick his ballon. How dare he try to get political capital out of the plight of rape victims. He deliberately inflated this non story from a hostile interview for his own means and could not give a flying fig for rape victims. If this was the Conservative party in opposition the MSM would be calling for Cameron to resign. Pathetic.

robert williams

Oldtimer "I too have now listened to the whole interview. It sounded to me that Clarke described the sentencing rules (administered by judges) very clearly."

Yes and those rules are that the starting point for sentencing is 5 years (& therefore 15 months for guilty plea & early release). Clarke refused to accept that this related to his "real rape" category, but failed to offer evidence to support his belief.

David Ossitt

What a thoroughly nasty piece of work Victoria Derbyshire appears to be.

I have not come across this young woman before but her interviewing technique was an absolute disgrace she was deliberately missing the point and was really working to her own agenda.

The BBC is getting worse by the day.

Herr Kartoffelkopf

When the aforementioned Derbyshire won a recent Sony Gold award they described her as "an outstanding & versatile presenter with an appealing determination to get to the heart of a matter"...must have got the envelopes mixed up!!

George Laird

Dear Nick

“he is clearly correct to distinguish between serious and less serious instances of rape, and brave to do so in the company he found himself in”.

Rape is rape, it is all serious.

I am struggling to picture what non serious rape is!

Yours sincerely

George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University

lids

What next. Gang rape plea. "I was the fifth and my colleagues forced me to do it, I plead guilty, please be lenient"?

Rape is rape and as the brave lady said the vast majority of sex offenders go on to do it again. And if a woman who has been raped thinks her attacker will be out in a year and a bit and will be back for a bit of revenge, why on earth bother reporting it to the police?

David Ossitt

George Laird and lids.

Small point a sixteen year old boy or girl has it off with their boy or girl friend who just happens to be fifteen years old but is in full agreement with the sex act.

The law says that the elder of the two is guilty of statutory rape.

Lone man with knife pulls woman into bushes and rapes his victim is guilty of rape.

Gang of youths gangbang some poor unfortunate woman it is rape.

Man and woman on a date both have too much to drink both end up in her bed, next morning she says I did not want to, it is called rape.

If you two can not see a difference between the first case and the second two then I am sorry for you both, if you can not see any difference between the second/third case and the last then god help us all.