They should be ashamed (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

They should be ashamed

THEY should hang their heads in shame. Who are these people? They are our Government's members of Parliament, our Government's county councillors and our Government's support workers.

Why? Because they let violent yobs and law breakers terrorise our streets and bring fear to law-abiding members of the public with impunity but they will put a 71-year-old pensioner in prison because he can not afford to pay a 76 per cent increase in his council tax.

You only have to pick up the Swindon Advertiser every night to read that a thief has not been given a prison sentence due to his drug habit as he needs help, not prison so we will give him another chance with an order from the court to seek treatment.

Or the drink driver who just keeps on breaking the law but as he is the main carer for his elderly mother perhaps he to should have another chance.

Or the yobs that get a ticking off after a drink-filled night of fighting in the streets and then damaging property on their way home.

Or the callous attacker who robs people of all ages.

Do any of them go to prison for their first ever action?

But a pensioner, a vicar who, in his working life has served his community and never broken the law of the land is jailed.

It's our Government that should hang its head in shame and not the likes of Mr Ridley who never had his son found in the street by the police in a drunk and disorderly state or himself stood up in Parliament and lied to its members and to all the public of this country to take us into an illegal war which has taken sons, fathers and husbands away from their loved ones and where some will never return to their families.

So who should hang their heads in shame?

Not Mr Ridley, who can walk tall with his head held high even though it might only be in a prison exercise yard at the moment just because he can't afford to pay his 76 per cent increase in his council tax.

It's not that he won't, it's because he can't afford to like so many others.

B J OSBOURN

Covingham, Swindon