Nobbut Laiking, by Ross Brewster
They talk the talk, but they don’t walk the walk when it comes to facing up to the “unprecedented challenges” in the criminal justice system.
Successive governments have been negligent and now the chickens are coming home to roost with a massive backlog of cases and judges reportedly being asked to delay sentencing because our prisons are at bursting point.
Some prisoners may be granted early release in a bid to ease overcrowding. The latest figures from the Ministry of Justice show that, as of 6th October, the prison population in England stood at 88,016, closing in on what officials have said is the capacity of 88,670. We now have a record backlog of 63,000 court cases.
The ministry gives an assurance that the most serious offenders will be sent to prison. Exactly how and where? It’s not good news for those who might have been victims of crime, but the Home Secretary is more intent on grabbing headlines and pandering to the right of her party than facing up to the disturbing failure of our justice system.
The departing Director of Public Prosecutions, Max Hill, told the BBC only last week there was an “unprecedented backlog” of cases awaiting trial which were not going to be resolved soon.
Right back to the early 2000s we witnessed the closure of our local magistrates’ courts. Pre-existing cuts, courts being closed during the pandemic and a strike by criminal defence barristers have all played a part. But this is a crisis that’s been coming for years. Government ministers have been blind to over-crowding in prisons and delays in dealing with cases.
Fewer crimes end up in court and we’ve seen offences like shoplifting almost become an accepted business hazard.
But the real public concern is if some violent offenders and thieves are being spared jail and instead handed meaningless community sentences, simply because we’ve run out of prison space to house them.
England cricket team deserve a dose of Dr Heath’s medicine
Dr George Heath (1745-1822) would have known exactly what to do with the England cricket team when they return home after some embarrassing performances in the World Cup, presently being contested in India.
Heath, a Canon of Windsor and Head Master of Eton College, was known as a perfectionist and, by all accounts, a sore loser. He would give the former holders of the World Cup short shrift. Indeed a call to the head’s study would closely attend their return to these shores.
On one occasion, when the boys of Eton School first eleven suffered defeat at the hands of Winchester School, they returned to a flogging. Even the scorer was flogged, “possibly unjustly” according to an entry in Carr’s Dictionary of Extra-Ordinary Cricketers, an excellent little compendium of stories gathered by the author J.L.Carr and edited by Matthew Engel.
Dr Heath, who was Head at Eton from 1792 to 1802, was clearly a hard taskmaster on the sporting field. Once Vicar of Piddletown — I kid you not — he occupied the fourth stall at St George’s Chapel, Windsor, combining religious duties with a strict view of education.
Today’s cricketers, their failings soon forgotten and floggings a thing of the distant past, will head off to sign lucrative contracts in various short form cricket competitions facing nothing worse than a berating in the cricketing media.
I’ve been doing beans wrong
There are times, I will admit, when my pleasure is spoilt by a soggy bottom.
Now after 70 plus years of eating baked beans regularly I discover I have been doing it all wrong and relief is at hand for the problem I have with soggy toast.
Heinz has published a guide, entitled You’ve Been Eating Your Baked Beans The Wrong Way, in a bid to help the 42 per cent of the population of this country who consume their famous product at least once a week.
So how do you like your baked beans? I wonder how many readers, like me, have been boiling in haste rather than gently warming. Using the wrong sort of bread for toasting and, most important of all, not storing our cans upside down and remembering to shake for five seconds, no more no less, before opening.
Just a thought, why don’t the manufacturers put the labels on upside down? It would save a lot of heartache at the dinner table.
Look, another thing. I’m a lazy microwave man. That, says etiquette expert William Hanson, is the cardinal sin. I do mine in a pot. Just a couple of minutes at most. But I should be using a stainless steel pan, stirring constantly for three to four minutes.
I never thought there was all this entailed in a quick meal. Not until I saw a news programme on TV which devoted as much time to preparing and cooking beans as it did to the conflict in Israel and Gaza.
Never boil your beans and use two slices of white farmhouse bread for the toast. Salted butter of a decent quality spread evenly right up to the crusts naturally.
Furthermore, Heinz provides the answer to my particular problem. Keep the toast and beans separate. See, no more soggy bottoms. Why didn’t I think of that before?
