Tackling crime means parents teaching kids the difference between right and wrong, says senior Conservative prison reforme

Children need to be taught in the home the difference between right and wrong if persistently high levels of crime and anti-social behaviour are to be reduced, according to a leading prison reformer and former treasurer of the Conservative Party.

Lord Farmer, who has conducted reviews of prisoner rehabilitation for the Government, deplored politicians who engage in a penal “arms race” by pledging longer and tougher prison sentences.

But he also condemned “liberal optimists” who claim that social and economic disadvantage is to blame for criminality.

He said that they assume people are basically good, that crime will plummet if unequal societal structures are reformed, and that high levels of criminality are driven by adversity and other ’causes’.

In a speech organised by the think-tank, the Centre for Social Justice, the Conservative peer linked high crime rates to unprecedented levels of family breakdown, saying that reversing this trend is critical to finding a lasting solution to levels of crime that have propelled the prison population to record levels.

All the evidence shows that children from broken homes are far more likely to break the law and wind up in prison.

Following on from the tougher sentences announced in the King’s Speech, he said:

“My response to the arms race which penal populism generates in necessarily vote-hungry politicians, is that, like the nuclear arms race, we simply cannot afford the price tag, either in sheer cash terms of £47,000 per prisoner per annum, or the squandering of human potential.”

He said that in the face of a “vengeful” public thirsting for retribution, senior politicians from the two main political parties know this and admit to it – but only once they have left office.

The counterpoint to this “penal populism” comes from “liberal optimists”, who maintain that high crime levels are driven by poverty, adversity and other forms of disadvantage.

But this “causalism” has now overtaken “moralism” – the traditional approach of teaching young people the difference between right and wrong and a sense of personal responsibility.

Lord Farmer said: “This country needs to find a way though the extremes of causalism aka liberal optimism or hard-edged moralism in the form of penal populism.

“We need a decent and humane prison system for men and women that is perceived by the public to be effective in both punishing and rehabilitating those willing to be reformed, so there is less crime and fewer victims.

“I have already referred to the neglected but indispensable role that stable parenting and family relationships play in keeping children safe and helping them to build a secure identity.

“To this I would add enabling parents to reinforce the difference between right and wrong in their children’s lives. They and not teachers are responsible for helping them self-regulate and be others-oriented instead of adopting the selfish and narcissistic approach to life of many popular role models.”

Lord Farmer highlighted the damage done to the nation’s social fabric by high levels of family breakdown and its links to criminal behaviour.

“The fabric of our relational life is becoming increasingly threadbare – almost half of all children do not grow up with both their parents, which means a high percentage grow up with enduring parental conflict and or in stepfamilies which are very hard for all parties to navigate, but particularly children.

“Moreover, children who grow up with non-biological father-substitutes, are eight times more likely to be on the at-risk register and 50 times more likely to die of an inflicted injury than those living with two biological parents. The CSJ found they are also twice as likely to get involved in crime.

“Seventy five per cent of young offenders did not grow up with both parents and 40 per cent were on the child protection register or experienced abuse or neglect. A full quarter of all those in our prisons spent time in local authority care, and, to quote a recent Lord Chancellor, ‘abuse and violence form the backdrop to the lives of many.’

But families are also critical to the rehabilitation of offenders, Lord Farmer said.

Official figures show that prisoners who receive visits from family members are 39 per cent less likely to reoffend than those who do not. This is far greater than the impact of access to educational and employment opportunities while in jail, which cut the likelihood of reoffending by 9 per cent, and that of treatment for drug and alcohol addictions, producing a 19 per cent drop.