Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

I think that that is right, and indeed the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, said very much the same. It is quite possible, within the ambit of the amendment, to achieve that objective. There may well be cases where what some call the ““short sharp shock”” may work. I think it will work in probably only a relatively small number of cases, but the option should certainly be open. As I say, I have some reservations about the second amendment, but I wholly endorse the first one. This is a matter that we need to continue to evaluate, but above all we need to ensure that the probation service in particular is given the resources that it needs to work with offenders so as to avoid not only the social and individual harm that is done, but also the enormous cost to the public purse of reoffending, where the rates remain unduly high.