fathers Britain 

We need to talk about absent fathers and crime

At the weekend, a 16-year-old boy died in Coventry from stab wounds and a man in his twenties was fatally stabbed in north London. Last week, a police officer put her helmet above the parapet on this issue. Jackie Sebire, assistant chief constable for Bedfordshire who leads on serious violence for the National Police Chiefs’ Council, said some young people who lacked the “protective factor” of a father figure looked up to drug dealers and gangsters instead. Of course, many factors contribute to crime; its causes are complex, and it…

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police Britain 

The need to balance humanity with calling criminals to account

Sir Tom Winsor, the chief inspector of constabulary, has a proposal for tackling crime which is likely to produce a rolling of eyes at the Home Office. Writing in this paper yesterday, Winsor said that a significant number of prisoners should not be in jail. Some suffer from chronic mental ill-health and are not evil, but ill. Many have experienced childhood domestic abuse, have received poor treatment for their disorders, have no sense of self-worth and believe they have nothing to lose from a life of crime. There’s much in…

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