"The creeping quangofication of governance has been a disaster for both policy and democratic accountability"
Telegraph: 7th March 2025: Opinion piece from the Telegraph questioning why unelected quangos, not elected politicians, making decisions which would bring about two-tier sentencing.
"After months of growing dissent over the perceived “two-tier justice” taking root in Britain, the Sentencing Council earlier this week ignited a major row with new guidance which appeared to confirm those fears...
The planned changes would make the ethnicity or faith of an offender a bigger factor when considering whether they should be jailed. The guidance stated that courts should contemplate ordering a pre-sentence report on offenders who came from “an ethnic minority, cultural minority, and/or faith minority community”, or who were “transgender”. Such reports are drawn up to provide information that could mitigate against jailing an offender...
Labour and Conservative front-benches have rightly taken a robust stance against the new rules and demanded they be scrapped. Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood has urged a reconsideration “as soon as possible”, and threatened to override them through legislation given that she cannot reverse the Sentencing Council’s decisions directly....
Shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick has stated that he will attempt to overturn the guidance through judicial review in the absence of any change in the law.
...Why has an unelected agency been handed control of such a politically sensitive matter, with ministers left powerless to overturn its decisions?"
UPDATE: READ "TWO-TIER JUSTICE QUANGO ADVISORS PRAISED 'BLACK LIVES MATTER'" HERE
ALSO:
READ POPCON'S MARK LITTLEWOOD COMMENT ON THIS TOPIC HERE.
WATCH POPCON'S MARK LITTLEWOOD ANSWER QUESTIONS ON THIS TOPIC ON GB NEWS HERE.
WATCH POPCON'S ANNUNZIATA REES-MOGG ON THIS TOPIC HERE.
READ THE CRITIC ARTICLE "THE SENTENCING COUNCIL IS WRONG. FULL STOP" HERE
READ SPECTATOR ARTICLE "THE SENTENCING'S COUNCIL TONE DEAF RESPONSE TO TWO-TIER JUSTICE CRITICISM" HERE