ABSTRACT
In march 2003, the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation announced the establishment of an Independent Inquiry into Alternatives to Prison, chaired by Lord Coulsfield, a recently retired Scottish appeal judge. This chapter discusses the use of prison. Simultaneously with the Coulsfield Inquiry’s deliberations, the think-tank CIVITAS published a report arguing that the rise in the prison population in England and Wales was probably causally linked to the recent reduction in crime – that is, more severe punishments had created a reduction in crime through deterrent and incapacitative effects. The chapter highlights concerns the potential for various alternatives to prison to achieve reductions in re-offending. Unfortunately, some commentators have made some very rash statements on this topic in recent years – including the official Halliday Report of 2001, which dared to speak of a possible 16 percentage point reduction in the national re-offending rate if offender behaviour programmes were ‘developed and applied as intended’.
