Labour is right: the Tories are soft on law and order

The spouse of one of Britain’s major party leaders would be forgiven for feeling both queasy and furious about Labour’s wave of attack ads against Rishi Sunak.

Not Akshata Murty, aka Mrs Sunak, who has already been through some very rough stuff about her and her husband’s tax affairs – but Victoria Starmer, wife of Keir, on the basis that those who dish it out must expect to have to take it back in kind and without complaint.

Politics is the proverbial rough old trade at the best of times, but there is now every sign that the looming 2024 general election will be one of the dirtiest ever. 

People of a Conservative disposition have been invited in recent days to express outrage on behalf of the Prime Minister, depicted by Labour as not believing child molesters should go to jail on the basis that 4,500 convicted paedophiles have been spared custodial sentences under the Tories.

Given that it turns out the prevailing sentencing guidelines were drawn up by a panel that included one Sir Keir Starmer when he was Director of Public Prosecutions, this smear is likely to rebound on Labour and on him.

Perhaps the two men will spend the election campaign arguing about which of them has been the more faithful friend to nonces everywhere. And what an edifying spectacle that would make.

According to Labour, Sunak doesn’t believe thieves should be punished either. Or that adults convicted of possessing a gun with intent to harm should be jailed.

But rather than sympathising with the likes of Tory deputy chairman Lee Anderson, who called Labour’s personal attacks on Sunak ‘vile’, there is an alternative perspective to be commended to those of us who take an old-fashioned view of crime and punishment. And that is that Labour’s decision to advance the narrative that the Tories are soft on law and order is to be welcomed.

For starters, it is largely true. There really has been an explosion in the number of serious criminals being spared jail in the increasingly rare instances of them being caught by the police and convicted of their crimes. There have also been many cases of terrible offences, including murders, being committed by dangerous offenders granted early release from previous prison terms.

In the Cameron and May years, a series of wishy-washy justice ministers, such as Rory Stewart and David Gauke, became fixated on the idea of non-custodial sentences offering better prospects for the rehabilitation of offenders.

Stewart even claimed that victims of crime would be ‘better off’ if there were fewer criminals in jail – a total U-turn on the ‘prison works’ strategy implemented by Michael Howard as home secretary a generation earlier.

In fact, Howard’s way – which involved a big rise in the prison population – coincided with a long fall in crime linked to the containment and deterrence functions of jail time. With many more prolific offenders behind bars there were simply fewer at large to victimise their communities, while their cannier associates came to realise many crimes were not worth the risk. Harsher punishment of criminals also had the happy effect of cheering up law-abiding citizens.

It is highly significant that two of Labour’s three law and order attack ads so far are based on the notion of prison being the appropriate sentence for whole classes of offending. This is an idea we should be happy to encourage and delighted to see the Tories pressurised on.

We should of course press Labour in return on aspects of their own stances which appear to indicate they would themselves be lax on law and order if they get into power. For example, Labour’s obsession with the aim of removing ethnic disproportionality from the criminal justice system would surely risk the police and prosecutors soft-pedalling against offending by those whose ethnic group had already chalked up its quota of convictions.

But overall, let’s by all means have a sentencing arms race, a prison population arms race, a street patrols arms race, an anti-parole arms race and an arms race on all kinds of other traditional and punitive penal policies that will make liberal progressives weep into their morning muesli. 

And whichever side wins that race – and with it the next election – should then expect to have the policy handcuffs put on them. They risk being accused of the most disgusting betrayal should they subsequently give so much as an inch to the Guardianista tendency which dominates the Home Office and Ministry of Justice.

All hail the new Robocop era and woe betide the next prime minister to call a halt to it. For the hounds of hell will be unleashed upon him.