Sir John Hayes

It is a great pleasure to serve in the Chamber with you in the Chair, Mr Deputy Speaker. I wish the new Government Front-Bench team well. They know that I have high regard for many of them, including the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) and the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North and Cottingham (Dame Diana Johnson), who are in their places. As a patriot, I wish the Government well, because they are in a position to run our country and there will be many matters on which we can agree. I have worked with a number of Government Members on the kinds of matters that go well beyond Punch and Judy politics, if I can call it that, particularly on national security. However, those good wishes are not the same as wishful thinking. Too much wishful thinking pervades the Government Benches. Having made change itself the brand, the risk they face is thinking that change alone is enough. CS Lewis said: “If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end; if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin, and in the end, despair.” Nevertheless, I wish the Government well. We are debating a number of challenges in this aspect of the King’s Speech today, but none more challenging than that of lawlessness. Too often when we debate crime, lawlessness and order in this Chamber, we give too little regard to the victims of crime. We simply must end the culture, which has pervaded for most of my lifetime, of believing that crime is an illness; to be treated. It is not an illness; it is a malevolent choice made by those who are careless of the harm they do. When we understand that, we understand why the principal objective of the criminal justice system must be punishment. A justly retributive response to that malevolence is necessary not only because it is the right thing to do, but because it is the component of the criminal justice system which maintains the public’s faith that justice will be done and be seen to be done.