Or perhaps unsubtly?
There have been a few cases recently of horrific murders, some involving the torture of victims beforehand. When you read the news reports on sentencing, they always say the murderer will be eligible for parole in 17 years, or 25 years or whatever.
Most people think life should mean life or at least as much of life as possible, like till 80. When MP's in the 60's voted for the abolition of the death penalty (against the will of the majority of voters) it was on the understanding that dangerous sadistic murderers would stay in prison until they were either very old men (usually men) or they died there. It was not on the understanding that a 29 year old would be sent to prison for torture and murder, and know that they would be let out at the age of 54, when they could still have a chance of a relatively normal life in the community, or indeed still be young enough to commit the same sort of horrible crime.
If someone asks me "what would you prefer? A life sentence or the death penalty for those people who killed that 15 year old/ that poor teenage girl who was raped, tortured, burned and murdered/ all those other victims who suffered horrifically and who will never have birthdays again?" I'd say life because I don't believe in the death penalty. (Sally Clarke and Angela Cannings could be dead now if we had it.) But if they asked if I'd prefer 25 years or the death penalty, then I'd say the death penalty frankly, because 25 years for having taken someone's life and hope and future and made them face death in agony and terror and put their friends and relatives through the anguish of that kind of loss seems shockingly frivolous to me - immoral in fact. And it seems to me that the authorities are deliberately making the death penalty more attractive by having these laughable sentences.
Am I just getting old and fearful or have I spotted a plot to butter us all up so that we'll find the re-introduction of the death penalty acceptable? Is this happening in other European countries (at the moment you can't be a member of the EU if you have the death penalty, but that could change)? Or is it just that it costs too much to keep brutal murderers in prison? Why doesn't life mean life? Why is the need for justice not being met, leading people to conclude that the death penalty needs to be re-introduced? I've met loads of people recently who have been life-long opponents of the death penalty but have changed their minds as a result of a few of these cases and the knowledge that the murderers will be out in their 40's and 50's (in some cases, even in their 30's)
Oh and I know the prison service is awful and prison needs reform, but this is about sentencing.