Who benefits?

As part of its response to this summer's riots, the government has announced that it intends to give the courts powers to cut up to £25 from the benefits of those convicted of and fined for a criminal offence.

Recently published research has shown - not very surprisingly - that most people convicted of looting in the riots are from the poorest communities across Britain, about a third of whom receive social security benefits.  Who actually believes that making poor people poorer is the way to cut crime?  David Cameron for one does.  "The system as it stands at the moment is far too soft," he claims.  

Social security benefits are set at a level the laws says people need to live on.  If nearly half is deducted by judges as fines, what does the government think people will do to survive?  But then Cameron, Clegg and Osborne don't think like us.  To them £60 is what they pay for a cheap bottle of wine, not what has to last them all week.

How not to stop riots

According to the Guardian, the government is considering allowing magistrates to withdraw social security benefits as part of its response to last month’s riots.  An epetition on the Government’s website to cut benefits from those found guilty of riot-related offences has attracted nearly a quarter of a million signatures.

Is there anyone who thinks magistrates withdrawing benefits, or councils evicting the families of convicted rioters, will make it less rather than more likely that rioting and looting happens in the future? It can only increase poverty, homelessness and hopelessness in already impoverished working-class communities.

Understanding and doing something about the social conditions that lead to rioting is not the same as thinking that they were a good thing ("a popular uprising" as some have misguidedly called them) or denying the personal responsibility of those who destroyed homes and businesses in their own communities. It is the only way of stopping them happening again.