Cutting Crime (Justice Reinvestment) Debate
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Tony Baldry
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Cutting Crime (Justice Reinvestment)
Tony Baldry Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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Mr Blunt
If my right hon. Friend can find a way of pulling off that piece of alchemy, it would be extremely welcome. It would certainly be a very welcome development in intelligent policy making. As the right hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Alun Michael) said, this is a question not just of the Government changing the rhetoric but of Parliament addressing the issue, and now we are in a position to do so because in essence all three main parties are in the same place on going for evidence-based policy making. That is a welcome change from policy-based evidence making.
Tony Baldry
One of the glories of the coalition is that some of our colleagues are wondrously optimistic. The reality is that certain sections of the press never report this issue fairly. Will my hon. Friend acknowledge that what we collectively have to do is to accept that as a given and press on regardless? The proof will come at the end of the day when we have reduced reoffending rates and, as a consequence, reduced the amount of money that we have to spend on prisons. However, the idea that the Poujadist press will suddenly wake up and see that that is good news is away with the fairies.