The Guardian reports that senior Labour figures mounted a last-ditch defence of antisocial behaviour orders last night after the home secretary, Theresa May, indicated she is to scrap Tony Blair’s flagship measure to deal with youth crime.
May said it was “time to move beyond the asbo”, arguing that they were never the promised silver bullet and had too often put young people on a conveyor belt to prison.
Two former Labour home secretaries, Alan Johnson and David Blunkett, attacked May’s decision. Johnson, in a piece for the Guardian’s Comment is Free, argued that asbos had made a huge difference in cutting crime and disorder: “If the home secretary is to restrict the opportunities for the police to use asbos and other measures currently available then this will be yet another example of this government going soft on crime.” Blunkett went even further and claimed May’s speech posed “a major threat to the lives of those at the very sharp end of criminality and dysfunctional communities”.
