A prisoner is released early and just days later attacks people. It then emerges that he was known to still be a danger to the public before he was let out. Normally at this point in the story one would be expecting ministerial resignations. But in the case of Sudesh Amman, the Streatham attacker, we are not. Why? Because the law meant that there was no alternative to him being released.
The government is now in a mad scramble to prevent this from happening again. Emergency legislation is being rushed through parliament to stop terrorists from being automatically freed from prison halfway through their sentence.
Historically, one of the Tories’ electoral strengths has been their reputation as the party of law and order. But in recent years, they have come perilously close to losing that reputation. In the 2017 election campaign, Labour hammered the Tories with the argument that police cuts were making people less safe.
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