Finally, the truth’s out about our broken jails

I HAVE long said that it is far harder to get into prison than into university in this country and people have thought I was joking – because the truth about our criminal justice system is so incredible that most of us cannot bring ourselves to believe it.

Well, the excellent and original think tank Civitas has now shown, in a study called Who Goes To Prison?, that I am right. Peter Cuthbertson has found that 70 per cent of prison sentences are imposed on criminals with at least seven previous convictions and 50 per cent are imposed on offenders with 15 or more previous crimes on their records.

Fewer than one in 12 prisoners are inside for a first offence – and where they are, it is usually a crime of extreme violence or a sex offence. An amazing 77 per cent of thefts do not result in prison time. The great majority of drug criminals in prison are there for supply, not for drug use.

These facts help explain why the police don’t bother with people who stink of cannabis and why the National Probation Service is so overwhelmed that it is reduced to ringing up its clients to see how they are getting on.

Soppy politicians who want to cut prison numbers will continue to ignore these figures, which actually show that our prisons are full because we are too lenient when we first catch wrongdoers. But what will happen when criminals themselves finally grasp that the justice system is made out of cardboard? The so-called ‘riots’ of August 2011 – in fact, a general breakdown of order – may be the last warning we get.