The Commission on English Prisons Today- presided over by Cherie Booth QC- launched its final report yesterday – with a demand to cut prison numbers and reinvest money in communities.

It is unequivocal. Our criminal justice system is in crisis. A decade and a half of penal excess means that we lock up too many people with too little impact and consequently we are failing make communities safer.
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There is a real difficulty in translating the Obama campaign to the UK. Inevitably, we end up focusing on the easy bits – the technology for example. The tougher bits such as how you pluck a energised movement out of the ether tend to be ignored. We focus on the more recent influences on Obama ‘08 – moveon.org and the Howard Dean campaign – and forget that it is actually rooted in very old-fashioned politics.

The Fabian Society’s Change We Need launched with self-conscious irony in Millbank Tower last night. Though excellent in many respects, it falls into this trap to a degree.
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Compass put on a sizzling debate last night on Labour’s future direction. Two contributions in particular stood out- those of Steve Richards and a devastating but completely constructive contribution by Jon Cruddas. Actually, I left the meeting feeling that if we don’t win the next election it won’t be because we lack ideas, conviction or talent.

First to Cruddas’ contribution. He counselled that the Conservatives have changed, not just in terms of style but in terms of philosophy as well and Labour underestimates that at its peril. Moreover, and anyone who followed the London Mayoral elections can vouch for this, they have adopted a new emotionalism to their political language. Labour’s language by contrast is managerial and aloof.
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