Discuss - Crime Prisons - Non-custodial alternatives for less serious crime

Should there be non-custodial alternatives to prosecutions for low-level offences?

Alliance Party The Alliance Party would seek to provide new alternatives to prosecutions for low-level offences. Source: Alliance Party website.

Conservative The Conservative party would give criminals tougher sentences, so that communities are protected and justice is seen to be done. Source: Conservative party website.

DUP The Democratic Union party would introduce tougher sentences, making prison terms the norm for those who attack the elderly and vulnerable. Source: DUP Party Manifesto.

Green Party The Green Party places significant focus on the social causes of crime, and aim to introduce a principle of 'restorative justice' to deal with both the victim and offender. The Green Party calls for the repeal of the Vagrancy Act 1824 because it is open to abuse by police and government. It discriminates against homeless people and wrongly labels them as criminals when their plight is a social problem. Cannabis would be removed from the 1971 Misuse of drugs act. The possession, trade and cultivation of cannabis would be immediately decriminalised. When individuals fail to make reparation or to pay taxes, maintenance, or other moneys where the present penalty for non-payment is imprisonment, they will be required to make reparation for their default through service to the community if no other way of recovering the money is effective. Source: Green Party website/manifesto.

Liberal Democrat The Liberal Democrat party would end the use of imprisonment for possession of drugs for personal use and move the drugs and alcohol policy lead from the Home Office to the Department of Health. Create sentencing options which are effective in protecting the public, while reducing the risks of re-offending. We want to see an enhanced role for restorative justice, and will do more to keep young people and women out of prison. Source: Liberal Democrat website / policies

Plaid Cymru "Rehabilitation and probation as opposed to ineffective short-term sentences that don’t prevent reoffending." Source: Plaid Cymru, http://www.partyof.wales/easy-read-manifesto/

Respect Party Respect would push for the scrapping of Anti-Social Behaviour Orders, and would also undertake a complete overhaul of the criminal justice system, as well as build supportive communities and tackle social exclusion.

SNP The Scottish National Party would introduce new measures to clamp down on crime, as well as take more "ill-gotten gains" from criminals, extending a "Cashback for Communities" scheme to return more money to the community. Source: SNP Website / Manifesto

UKIP UKIP believes that full sentences should be served and this should be taken into account when criminals are convicted and sentenced in court. Parole should be available for good behaviour on a case-by-case basis, not systematically. Source: UKIP website

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