Tony Martin Laws
A Conservative party is again trying to change the law on what householders may or may not do to burglars.Last time backbench MP Tony Gale drafted a law that would have allowed the householder to kill anyone he thought might be about to commit a crime -- with no repercussion. I pointed out here you could kill your own grandmother if you thought she was about to steal an apple from one of your trees.
Predictably that attempt failed. So they're back, this time the Shadow Attorney General, Dominic Grieve, has drafted a law that says you can use anything except 'grossly disproportionate' force -- in other words you can use disproportionate force.
The Economist points out the lunacy of these plans. The current law, which allows you to use 'reasonable force' has only seen two people imprisoned for attacks on burglars [in recent memory - see comments -- there are others]. One of course was wannabe Tory MP, Tony Martin, who repeatedly shot a burglar in the back as he was escaping. The second was Barry-Lee Hastings, who stabbed a man 12 times in the back, and kept stabbing as he had left the house. Householders have killed burglars and not been prosecuted.
In other words the law works, and works well. The Economist notes that Michael Howard is doing this for other reasons - his lack of success in the opinion polls. He described the current law as 'typical of the topsy-turvy, politically correct world in which we live'; something the Economist correctly calls the 'tut-tutting of a pub bore'.
Tories are meant to support laws that work, and change ones that don't. And leaders.
posted by Matthew @ 12/11/2004 09:50:00 AM
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