The Lammy Review: A solution to ISIS and Brexit divisions: Part 3 Solutions

The Lammy Review: A solution to ISIS and Brexit divisions: Part 3 Solutions

Well it has been a long wait has it not? If you managed to slog your way through my previous articles on the Lammy Review you will equally feel like this might be another one of those reports which gathers dust.

Yet, there is potential in the review.

In the UK, we are in a social deficit, trust between communities is one of the lowest in the last 10 years, and while in some small ways things are improving we cannot help but recognise there is a problem.

One of the takeaways from the Lammy Review is the increased detainment of Muslims, now this could be perfectly legitimate, perhaps there are more criminals being detained, the choice of the courts could be entirely ambivalent. The problem is that the courts are reticent to any investigation of their decision-making process. Perhaps because the judges themselves know there is a problem?

Another is that amongst the BAME community there is still is strange skewing of figures.

Now, I very much doubt that the judiciary should have equal conviction figures, Lammy suggests we should have convictions roughly equal to population demographics as if only some many criminals are born to families. In fact, I feel honest figures should be skewed to some extent, after all not everyone is a criminal and not every criminal is in prison. I would expect more thefts to occur for example from those whom have less wealth themselves, and expect more fraud conducted by those in white collar jobs, just based on how these are crimes of opportunity.

We cannot expect criminality to follow the U-curve like education and there is a big problem with making substantive decisions on statistics which have not been properly investigated. One being we should have criminals in equal number to the population, or that class, and mentality are cursory considerations. For an answer, we need qualitative and quantitative research. From there we can start to address the underlying causes and the current problems.

Problems of the UK:

Now a brief outline of the problems the UK faces, since the Iraq war in 2001, there has been increasingly heightened tensions amongst the Muslim community and other communities. I can recall the story’s after the 7/7 when children were being prevented from riding on buses because of fears they had explosives. Completely unfounded of course, yet that was what the scare had done. Compare it to how during the ‘Troubles’ the Irish were victimized as much as the BAME community based on ethnicity.

Now, in rolls Brexit, an excuse to act on any brewing tensions related to immigrants, increased news reports of the ‘bad eggs’ as if they are everywhere and citizens being trained to suspect everyone, with a beard and turban (apparently, this includes Sikhs, the similarities I guess). As well as new Terror Laws and people being afraid to go outside, heighted gang crime – fear -fear -fear.

Understandably, a police force trained to notice suspicion, starts to round up ‘suspects’ for doing things out of the ordinary, police understaffed are now expected to perform miracles and any failing of public security is there fault. Better then to arrest 10 innocents then let the 1 felon get away?

The courts equally, understand this position, and make mistakes – although some from a more isolated upbringing come to find their court experiences to be the fact, and so are unable to judge the characters they meet in court with a balanced mindset.

A government already under pressure to build a grand economy, with no plans, and organise the biggest endeavour has little time to worry about public cohesion.

There’s more, but let’s get straight to Solutions, we all know the UK has enough issues.

Solutions

Issue

Smashing ISIS recruitment, it is well established fanatics are not born overnight, when we have a system which discriminates against Muslims, and BAME, even the working class and casts everyone with the same hue, a few honest people are bound to turn to radicalism, because they find acceptance there.

Solution

·        Quite simple, end the discrimination, sounds easy, and it is but it comes with consequences. Part of the problem is having an endemic system of racism where improper practices fly under the radar. The courts need to be willing to suspend a judges ability to practice if it is clear they are not making valued judgements. As for the police, the bad apples need to be seen to be getting arrested, no more promotion or tossing from the police force (with a generous pension) if anyone else did it, they would get hard time – no one is above the law, not judges, not the constabulary.

·        But, lets not stop there, once a week judges should be paid to go down to different places of worship, BAME community groups, and schools – including state schools – for discussions and to learn about these communities, take it as a cultural education long overdue. (After all, you get paid to go do Jury service, we cannot expect a judge to avoid work and risk losing his home for nothing)

·        Equally, the police should also spend time with different parts of the community, they should be given the time to get to know the good people in the community and not be subjected to seeing only the bad.

·        However, if you do this, there is a risk that another group which otherwise supported the practice will feel alienated and for those bad apples still hanging around they might try to skew the rules to stay around. So, a mass routing out needs to be done. With a strong core, we can go out and deliver justice to the people without fear of wrongfulness.

·        The next step is community cohesion, the judiciary is solved, yet we need social climbers, to show that the rose-tinted glass can be broken. Implementing a form of civil service where the youth are able to experience time with different workers in the establishment will give them a valuable experience, open doors and enable them to build trust in the profession, whilst at the same time exposing those in employment to new mindsets – they say one of the greatest joys is teaching, and if industry were able to utilise the next generation that would increase experience, whilst allowing them to reduce workloads if they train students to help them.

Issue

Prisoners rehabilitation or lack thereof? And rising reoffending rates?

Solution

·        There are a great many solutions, which are affordable, check the work which MPs are currently doing on a review of Restorative Justice in England and Wales, they have found across the UK it reduces reoffending and reduces court costs in the long term.

·        As for adult offenders, there are a few solutions – a prisoners island, which can act as an independent community enabling prisoners to reintegrate with what life on the outside is like.

·        Lammy suggested closing criminal records, or only revealing them for certain jobs since a previous history of conviction no matter how long ago can ruin someone’s chances at getting employment.

·        I would go a step further, and say wipe the record for minor offences as soon as a prisoner leaves prison. Keep it on file for court cases, and make it available for indictable offences. Yet, otherwise it is an unnecessary barrier placed on prisoners.

·        For prisoners, as Lammy identifies, discover the needs of the prisoner before they enter prison, before they even get conviction, if they are drug users rehab might be better. If they have a mental ailment, then a specialist hospital could give them better support. If it is education, then a prison should take steps to provide it – not for free (perhaps a special tax imposed on leaving prison) to be fair to those students whom go to university or college and have to pay, this is an investment in the future so it should be fine.

·        Prisoners already do prison jobs, perhaps these could be more tailored to short comings in society, prisoners on release could fill a number of work placements which others are perceived as overqualified for.

Issue

More police arrests of BAME and verdicts going through?

Solutions

·        Let the legal advisors be accompanied by respected people within the community, advice from a stranger is hard to swallow, advice from a friend easier. If I hated lawyers but respected my local clergymen or doctor, having there frank opinion may persuade me to make the right choice.

·        As for higher police arrests, let BAME members of the community go out on shifts with the police, the insight from both sides might help identify the real criminals and not unlawful arrests.

Issue

A fall in the quality of the judiciary?

Solution

·        Best not to get defensive, Barristers, Solicitors, Judges, Clerks, Police officers are incredibly overworked and underpaid. We all know it, so what is the value in continuing down this fruitless endeavour?

·        A fully functional, diverse system serves the people better and increases the economy of the nation. How so? You might ask. Well lets walk through it.

·        Say I pay a barrister ￡4,000 for a case, and ￡20,000 for everyone else in the room. If the Barrister knows the case, know his field, we can reach a conclusion quickly, and it all ends in one hearing. The junior barrister also learns from his senior and when they go solo on a case, another good outcome.

·        Now say the dynamics change, we do not pay that top barrister, we get a junior barrister 1,000, and the rest of the room costs the same 20,000 now that case could end quickly or it could end badly, another court session might be called -so that the original savings of ￡3,000 actually become a loss of -￡18,000. Apply this across the board, the cost of a prisoner is roughly ￡40,000 a year, more then the cost to send someone to university, and if they are not rehabilitated that will be an ongoing cost, now that cost does not factoring in having to build additional prisons, train additional staff, and the loss to the community. If we had rehabilitated that one prisoner and for the next 20 years they had a minimum wage job that means the country would be ￡60,000 better off each year, because the cost of prison in negated and they are contributing to the economy, in 20 years that’s ￡1.2 million contributed to the country. All because we spent ￡3,000 to get a better barrister.

·        Now say we apply that to all these ‘schemes’ like pre-sentencing talks, maybe that costs ￡30,000 to arrange, yet it negates every cost which follows. Also, it sets a pattern, the more a process is used the cheaper it gets so while pre-sentencing costs ￡30,000 at first that cost might fall to ￡10,000 as people become used to the process.

·        Equally, let’s assume the legal aid cuts are reversed, and actually more money is pumped into criminal law. That means more barristers can be hired, more legal aid workers, more volunteer opportunities, easier workloads and better end results. Criminals have their own cost on society, a failure to address them properly creates social disconnect which has plenty of hidden costs.

·        If I was determined, and I meant really determined I could highlight thousands of situations where one stray decision has led to mass knock on costs. A real investment in our future will do just that, if there were more judges able to handle cases, then they would have more time to deliberate on the ones before them, if barristers were better paid they would be able to take the time to do cases, and have enough support to do them well. If police were not understaffed, and bullied they would be able to make better judgement decisions.

·        Not everything is about money, but right now, we cannot say that having so many fighting for their livelihoods it is not very important.

Issue

Brexit, how do we thrive?

Solution

·        Big question, short answer, invest in our legal systems and our people. Yes, if that means loans we need to take that step, this country was built on human capital and that is how we are going to get out of this mess.

·        No more fiscal depression policies, lets reinvest in our legal industry whom are so linked to trade, and the wellbeing of our people. Happy people, make happy workers, and happy workers are productive workers. Money will help to reduce the number of barristers undergoing burnout, however, the money needs to be spent well.

·        I suggest that chambers take advantage of the current apprenticeship scheme and apply it to pupillages, traineeships, if inns of court are happy to top up salaries along with firms, and the chambers themselves then this will enable more to practice in the field.

·        If we make the route to the bar easier, then as a consequence judges will meet more people, police will meet more nationalities, we will be training a generation of legal experts to deploy worldwide and maintain dominance in the legal sector. Simple solution.

·        The answer sometimes is just bigger being better, the more people we can get into the industry sharing the workload, the better the quality at the end and the longer employees are able to work for (less of the 10 year drop outs). They might leave firms to make more money overseas but at the end of the day, we go where we can settle into life, and if the legal industry in the UK is not overtaxing this is where talent will settle and where it will return to.

·        The current system marries lawyers, and everyone involved to a rather bleak existence, as flashy as that bleak existence is. If we can address that problem, then our costs will become more manageable.

Conclusion

I do not think by any stretch of the word this is the full extent of solutions (I have more) available but at this point I have written close to 10/12,000 words today so have little encouragement to go further.

I have spent over 10 years of my life considering countless solutions to the UKs problems, some I have seen implemented by others which is always good to see, still we hold ourselves back.

What it all comes back to can be summarised by reading a book called ‘Deming, The New Economics’, basically, if the machines broken do not blame the operator, design a new machine, because a quick fix will always be just that, it does not solve problems just ensure more costs.

So, if you blanket cut costs, does it improve services? Well next time you have do a job, ask yourself if you were working commission and that one job only paid for 1/100 of your weekly expenses would you a) Make sure it was really good, and go the extra mile despite receiving no extra pay, or b) do the bare minimum, because if you waste time your children will be starving tonight.

Now who do you think delivers a quality service?

I have not included a number of questions, like how likely a government is to implement these charges. Honestly, we have yet to be provided with proof that any government in successive years have committed to take steps for the long-term future of our nation, from Coalition onwards there has been a mix match of some long-term solution and many short term with long term solutions later getting scrapped. And so much infighting, not conducive to negotiations.

It is very hard to judge, because everyone is working as hard as they can to solve our problems, however, they are working as independent units, perhaps that’s the problem?

Ultimately the Lammy review needs to be incorporated into a post Brexit strategy, it has that potential, and can be given legislative empowerment