We`ve had ASBOs and CRASBOs; DBOs and CBOs; CPNs, DPPOs and now since 2014 PSPOs. Apart from the tiny minds with little memory, long on aliteration and low on original thought is there any hope at all that those who advise the new Justice Secretary will find their comeuppance as did many who were faced down by Michael Gove......may his reputation seek resurrection. Last week I posted on the limitations the justice system is facing with regard to those who are a public nuisance owing to their addiction. Depending on sources it is estimated that 50% - 70% of all criminal activity is based on the perpetrators` drug and/or alcohol addictions. Of about 200,000 violent crimes annually in England and Wales it is thought that just under half were committed under the influence of alcohol.
Boston Magistrates` Court on Monday was a shameful example of how we treat alcoholics whose public behaviour is intolerable. But disposals similar are handed out in their hundreds week in and week out all over the country. Sooner or later a government must grasp the nettle and find a way of making compulsory confinement and treatment available for those for whom the only future prospect is an early pauper`s death followed by a pauper`s funeral in a borough cemetery funded by perhaps the same council that authorised the use of PUBLIC SPACE PROTECTION ORDERS. I have it; let`s have CCTOs: COMPULSORY CONFINEMENT AND TREATMENT ORDERS or would it be quicker to wait for Godot?
I wonder if the Bench asked the obvious question: if these defendants are homeless, living on the street, then wherelse can they drink? Residents of shelters cannot generally take alcohol on the premises. Fines will either not be paid or will take an age to pay off.
ReplyDeleteIf I lived on the street I think I would need the comfort of alcohol to deal with it.
Once again we attempt to deal with what is fundamentally a social problem requiring a range of (no doubt costly) inputs by simply legal means. It won't work.