from the utilitarian question of public safety, it is desirable on other principles too that non-trivial offenders should go to jail. One is that punishment is how society signals that stealing and violence are wrong. Another is that absence of punishment tells victims they don't matter. Why ? I didnt kill anyone last night even though I had an argument. Was it because I was frightened of going to jail ? Someone had a lucky escape ##The focus should be primarily on removing crominals from society and punishing them,## The article carefully explained how this approach is what criminlogists call bullshit . We have the highest prison rate in the industrialised world ( Scotland) except for the US. It does not work . Good grief what will it take to get folk to understand? Whilst i am usually happy to criticise the London-centric myopia of the Guardian I have to say that this is taking touchiness a bit far. The Guardian is an English paper, published in England, and the majority of her readers live in England. Do you get English people going onto the Scotsman's web-site, when it is talking about Scottish law, complaining that it has failed to put the disclaimer "this only happens in Scotland" before every reference to a legal principle? It is definitely not the best palce for rehabilitation, but it is a good way of getting free labour. The new neoliberal off shoring to get cheap slave labour - private prisons. They definitely get