Crime And community: prevention And healing
Restitution for the victim and the community and rehabilitation of the offender are key ingredients of the Green approach to the criminal justice system.
While prison plays an important role in the criminal justice system it should not be used as a way of simply holding people with long-term social problems, drug addictions and mental health problems. The prison population has steadily increased since 1990 without any clear correlation with levels of crime.
We support restorative justice as an effective response to wrongdoing and conflict in communities, with a balanced focus on the offender, the victim, and community.
Millions of pounds have been spent over the past decade on the deployment of surveillance technology, with no evidence-base to back it up. Labour has increasingly resorted to authoritarian methods, but this has failed to reduce the fear of crime. Labour has also failed to live up to its promise to be tough on the causes of crime. Poverty, inequality, social deprivation and environmental injustice are still rife in our society.
Civil liberties have been sacrificed for unproven technological fixes that divert resources from proven techniques that strengthen communities and reduce crime. Greens will develop and invest in a range of crime reduction and prevention measures that focus on tackling local sources of potential crime and improving the safety of our communities.
Labour is once again seeking to trample civil liberties underfoot in favour of an unproven, impractical technological fix by seeking to introduce compulsory ID cards. We oppose their plans to fingerprint and track the entire population of Britain for a National Identity Register.
We do not agree with the government’s claim that the population must add biometrics to their passports. International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) standards only require that the passport photo be digitised. For the same cost it would be possible to pay for 10,000 new police officers. Civil liberties and fiscal prudence mean we must reject ID cards.
Green MPs will work to:
- oppose ID cards;
- appoint more community police officers to focus on crime prevention;
- treat drug-taking as a health rather than a crime issue, rehabilitating the victims of addiction rather than locking them up;
- establish police forces with local accountability to independent democratically controlled police authorities;
- improve the design of our cities to provide safer streets and public spaces and strengthen communities;
- support an independent Police Complaints Procedure;
- provide universal access to high quality youth facilities;
- increase resources for caretakers, attendants and staff on estates, railway stations, parks and other public areas;
- ensure swift repair of damage done to public amenities and spaces.
From 1994 to 2003, the average prison population increased by 17%. In the same period the female prison population has increased by 68%; over four times the growth in the male prison population.
“Overcrowding has arguably become the single most problematic factor in maintaining order and security in Scottish prisons. It places enormous stress on the prisoner population and the finite resources of the Scottish Prison Service.” – Scottish Prison Complaints Commission, June 2004