CS: alternative to what? Dear Sir

Published date01 March 1982
Date01 March 1982
DOI10.1177/026455058202900119
Subject MatterArticles
34
of
chapter
IV
I
had
decided
that
here
was
a
book
which
was
a
well
reasoned
account
of
the
differences
between
the
theory
of
the
work
and
the
realities
of
practice.
I
was
mistaken.
Much
of
the
remaining
five
chapters
consists
of
ten-
dentious,
emotive
writing
with
little
respect
paid
to
logic.
Having
berated
Paul
Halmos
for
&dquo;combining
an
awful
analogy
with
a
muddled
metaphor&dquo;
the
authors
commit
far
more
heinous
crimes
themselves.
They
attempt
to
differentiate
between
the
handling
of
working
class
debts
(e.g.
the
way
criminal
courts
enforce
the
pay-
ment
of
fines
and
compensation)
and
the
treatment
of,
by
inference,
middle
and
upper
class
people
in
the
bankruptcy
court.
But
a
bankruptcy
court
would
treat
an
artisan
with
the
same
degree
of
tolerance
as
it
exercised
towards
John
Stonehouse
and
a
criminal
court
would
look
with
no
greater
favour
on
the
non-
payment
of
a
fine
by
a
member
of
the
aristocracy
than
it
would
show
towards
a
factory
worker.
What,
I
ask
the
authors,
is
the
relevance
of
the
fact
that
Mr
Stonehouse
was
driven
from
his
bankruptcy
in
a
&dquo;silver
Rolls-
Royce&dquo; ?
Should
it
be
an
offence
to
have
a
friend
or
relative
with
an
expen-
save
motor
car?
It
would
have
been
logical
to
com-
pare
like
with
like,
not
to
attempt
to
relate
treatment
of
an
ex-MP
in
a
civil
court
with
that
which
the
&dquo;working
classes&dquo;
receive
in
a
criminal
court.
I
assume
that
the
authors
would
not
have
found
it
germane
to
their
argument
to
have
reminded
their
readers
that
Mr
Stonehouse
was
also
sentenced
to
a
term
of
imprisonment
by
a
criminal
court.
Examples
of
muddled
thinking
and
the
drawing
of
misleading
conclusions
abound,
but
one
other
example
will
suffice:
the
authors
write
that
&dquo;State
functions
which
represent
a
gain
for
the
working
class
are
extremely
contradic-
tory
because
they
also
provide
benefits
for
capitalism.
For
example
the
National
Health
Service
has
obviously
helped
to
improve
the
health
and
general
condition
of
working
people.
But
it
also
benefits
the
owners
of
capital
to
have
a
healthy,
strong
labour
force
who
will
not
be
off
sick
or
operating
under
par.
In
this
respect
the
State
carries
out
tasks
for
capitalism
as
a
whole,
relieving
individual
employers
from
attending
to
these
needs
of
their
workers.&dquo;
Two
points
can
be
made
in
relation
to
those
statements:
(1)
The
State
is
itself
the
largest
single
employer
of
labour
in
the
nation;
(2)
The
great
benefits
of
the
National
Health
Service
to
the
entire
population
may
indeed
have
the
peripheral
effect
of
benefiting
private
employers,
but
the
advantages
accruing
to
the
population
as
a
whole
far
outweigh
what
the
authors
seem
to
see
as
unfair
help
for
indus-
trialists
without
whom
in
many
cases
there
would
be
a
far
greater
pool
of
unemployed
workers.
There
are
many
frustrations
and
dis-
appointments
in
probation
work,
but
in
my
view
social
work
with
the
individual
is
of
paramount
importance,
and
the
authors’
attachment
to
their
ideal
of
a
totalitarian
state
is
both
unrealistic
and
unhelpful.
Yours
faithfully,
G.
E.
SAMSON
Windlesham,
Surrey.
CS:
alternative
to
what?
Dear
Sir,
It’s
nice
to
see
community
service
getting
the
space
it
deserves
in
PJ
(Dec
’81).
The
contributions
by
both
Godson
and
Varah
deserve
to
be
widely
cited
and
used.
I’m
writing
to
expand
a
point
in
Godson’s
article,
which
suggests
that
I,
among
others,
have
been
proceed-
ing
from
&dquo;idealised
assumptions
about
penal
philosophy&dquo;,
specifically
in
view-
ing
the
community
service
order
as
a
tariff
sentence.
I
plead
guilty
to
the
charge
that
I
think
it
ought
to
be,
but
innocent
of
the
charge
that
I
think
it
is
so
used.
In
fact,
Godson
cites
our
re-
search
as
early
evidence
that
it
was
not
so
used.
These
are
two
points
to
be
made
here.
The
first
is
that,
whether
or
not
a
new
sentence
is
tariff,
it
replaces
another
sentence
whenever
it
is
used.
So
to
say
that
a
sentence
is
individualised
does
not
mean
it
is
not
an
alternative
to
custody.
The
second
point
is
that,
although
God-
son
is
absolutely
right
in
suggesting
that
we
cannot
aspire
to
a
state
of
affairs
where
community
service
is
always
an
alternative
to
active
custody,
what
we

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