Thugs laugh while we despair

Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime? How hollow Tony Blair’s promise rings today as we report the early release from prison of a gang of Wolves football hooligans who brought terror to central London.These 14 were jailed last month for between seven and 16 months. Now, because our prisons are full, they are being let out early. Some will be home for Christmas.

This is a grotesque failure by this wretched Government which has promised to fight crime but has chucked in the towel. How could it be tough on crime without providing enough prison places?

The weasel words from Whitehall today are that offenders such as the Wolves thugs are “low-risk.”

Really? As a matter of record, these hooligans rampaged through a crowd of innocent shoppers in Leicester Square, punching and kicking total strangers.

Imagine the shock, the terror and the indignation of ordinary decent people attacked by these savages. The very least the victims might expect is that their attackers are properly punished.

Dream on.

In Tony Blair’s Britain two million motorists are hammered for piffling speed offences each year. A pupil who is unable to understand Asian immigrants is accused of racism. A grandmother who allegedly refused to return a ball kicked into her garden is arrested, DNA-sampled and accused of theft.

But real criminals are given chance after chance by our soft-headed courts and hardened thugs are released after serving a fraction of their jail terms.

As we reported this week, inmates released early so far under tagging schemes have committed five killings, 56 woundings and 700 assaults.

Against this background, releasing the Wolves thugs early is an affront to natural justice and a huge gamble brought about by a total failure of New Labour’s cack-handed policies on law and order.

The guilty will celebrate Christmas at home. The innocent can only despair.

___________________________________________________________________

It’s time to get out of Iraq - and fast

We have overstayed our welcome in Iraq. In 2003 British soldiers were greeted as liberators.

Today, they are doing little more than providing targets for a rag-bag assortment of guerillas.

The head of the British Army, Sir Richard Dannatt, says the presence of UK soldiers is only making the security problem worse.

Tony Blair, obsessed with his “legacy,” wants to withdraw from Iraq on a high note. The message today, which cannot be ignored, is that high notes are nowhere on the agenda.

The sooner we withdraw and let Iraqis sort out their own destiny, the better.