A cursory glance at the columns of this newspaper will tell you that if there is one area of life not hit by the recession then it’s law-breaking.

Six days a week, the reader is treated to a seemingly endless parade of Worcester’s finest, displaying with a depressing regularity just how low some people can sink. This is the show that runs and runs, undoubtedly destined to outlast even Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap.

The recurring theme is violence. We live in an age where it is apparently impossible for a certain type of young man to have a few beers without wanting to attack a fellow human being.

This capacity for brutality plumbed fresh depths last year when a Member of Parliament was set upon by a roaming mob of teenagers just because he refused to hand over some balloons intended for his parents’ golden wedding celebrations.

Like many other Worcester people I was yearning for some appropriate sentencing, but no.

This cowardly scum ended up with suspended jail terms which – as I pointed out at the time – was no justice at all.

I daresay that there will be many of you out there who will wholeheartedly agree that this was yet another ‘punishment’ woefully failing to match the crime.

Some people think that prison is a soft option these days but I’m not so sure. The vast majority of criminals would probably regard the sudden loss of freedom much like anyone else – something to be avoided at all costs.

There is no doubt that the issue of overcrowding in prisons is increasingly being taken into account by judges and magistrates. And Government guidelines are certainly pressurising the judiciary into avoiding custodial sentences wherever possible.

Sadly, the continuing savagery in our towns and cities would indicate that the kid glove is not working.

We therefore need to replace it with the mailed fist and build more jails so that our streets can become safer.

lTHE fireworks season has started once again, a classic example of how personal gratification has taken priority over the greater good.

Alarm old people, terrorise pets? To hell with it, I want my childish way. A year or so ago, an idiot in St John’s gained a certain notoriety for doing precisely this. Unfortunately, November fifth is still some way off, so there will still be a lot of things that go bump in the night in the lead-up to the annual triumphalism over popery.