To be sick of living in a country that has decriminalised crime (Scotland)

[Torven]

As you'll all be aware, it's very hard for an under 25 to be sent to prison now even if they commit a really violent assault or rape that leaves the victim with lifelong injuries. There is no reason for under 25s not to commit crime (aside from their own moral compass:-/ ) unless they're planning to go into a line of work that requires a background check.

Now, the law is being changed so that criminals won't be held in prison on remand except in very rare cases. So, victims will have to cope with dangerous people living alongside them for months and maybe years.

Why do people keep voting for this? And calling it "kindness"? It's frightening. Criminals might be vulnerable but non-criminal vulnerable people are completely stuffed. If you don't have a big threatening guy to chase people off you're fair game.

The Scottish health system has all the same problems as the English. I don't see anything for the money. I don't mind paying for something that works and creates a good safety net but this is a country that is protecting people less, not more.

When the Tories are doing a better job of running a country that’s saying something, but I really do think they are. That’s how bad things are here. And I don’t even live on a Scottish island.

The US incarceration rate is about 4x that of the UK.

Since June last year, the Scottish NHS has been performing worse than England on virtually every measure, from A and E waiting times to ambulance delays, cancer treatment delays and surgery waiting lists.

There is a consultant recruitment crisis with posts vacant across Scotland, worsened by doctors having to pay £2,000 a year more income tax here than in England. GP practices have been closing to new patients, or struggling to run with foreign locums. The SNP have made a mess of every devolved area they attempt to run, from education to health, transport and the economy.

What are the tories doing better at out of interest?

Well it's not as if there's overwhelming evidence that prison works is it?

If you didn't live a nice middle class life you would be dreading what this means for your quality of life. "Prison doesn't work" is a sentiment for those who have no fear in their lives.

Locking up rapists, taking a hard line on blokes-pretending to be women who want to waltz into ladies loos, English kids can get into Scottish unis far more easily than Scottish kids can, English schools do much better than Scot’s in international educational league tables (with Scot’s pulling out as it was getting so embarrassing), then there’s drugs deaths and obesity. And in England there are ferries you can get to the to the Isle of Wight etc. speak to the poor people of Uist or Mull about that!

Well OP, we have just raised an entire generation of kids who now don't believe their words or actions should have any consequences. Feelings matter more that logic, science, or law. This is how we raised them, we got what we wanted.

Those laws around crime are designed to appeal to the above generation, so that they will vote for the party which sanctioned them.

Another example of why the best argument against Scottish independence is the SNP.

Totally agree

too young to be fully criminally responsible for your actions

old enough to change sex

welcome to SNP Scotland. Sadly there are so many people who are brainwashed and would vote for a dogshit if it had a black and yellow rosette on it so who knows when it will change.

It works by removing dangerous criminals from society for a period. That’s kind of the point of prison (or one of the points).

I get that of course. If they really need to be removed then, so far as I can see, the Judge has that option.

If they're not dangerous but need training and rehabilitation is prison, with all its baggage for their future, the best place to deliver that training etc.

@TooOldForThisNonsense Yep that about sums it up. It's incredibly depressing.

Move then. You'll soon get a shock at the grass is greener Tory mess down south. Cheerio!

There is just no effective opposition to the SNP right now so they do whatever they want. And they’ll keep doing it because the carrot of independence is perpetually dangled in front of voters.

Agree with majority, yanbu

Well, the grass is no greener but it would be 5k cheaper for my household and if a 21 year old raped me or knocked my husband unconscious then he might at least in theory go to jail for it.

Your defensiveness is so irrational. A shame that so few scots have that giftie of seeing ourselves as others see us...

But clearly Sean Hogg is dangerous. Being dangerous or not clearly isn't being utilised as a differentiating factor when it comes to raping teenage girls

But Sweden’s crime rate has massively increased in the last few decades. In the 1970s they had very low rates of gun crime and rape. Not true today.

As with every other form of dreamy left-wing idealism, it sounds great in the university seminar room, or sixth form debating society, but doesn’t work in practice. I’m not right-wing on crime. I oppose the death penalty, and I recognise that people do not all get the same start in life. Abuse, trauma, mental illness, etc, also play a part. But constantly telling people they are victims backfires. The only approach that works is a sensible, humane conservative one: you have done wrong, and you are going to be punished. However, we are not going to humiliate or degrade you. There will be a prison therapist, and there will opportunities for you to re-train and contribute something to society. So accept you have done wrong, take your punishment, stop blaming everyone else, and don’t do it again. If you do, we’ll lock you up.

There's something about that case that's either not in the public domain or is extremely difficult to find and which differentiates it from the public's perception of what 'raping teenage girls' constitutes.

Until I know what that is I'm reserving my opinion on whether he should be inside or not.

So, there is something that we cannot know that you have a feeling about that keeps your world view in tact? That's convenient.

It's not true to say under 25's don't get a custodial sentence for rape www.cumnockchronicle.com/news/23577423.rhys-roberts-rape-sentence-judge-says-no-alternative-custody/ as an example.

Can you find a report of his trial where his evidence and that of his victim is clearly laid out. HAve the full remarks of the judge at sentence been published?

We're told he was convicted by a jury so presumably his plea was not guilty. Normally, or at least in England, that would be a massive aggravating factor in sentencing.

To me, as a long term observer of the law, something does not add up.

it will never be a good thing for the victim.