I JUST heard Russell Findlay MSP pontificating about what we should do to youths who throw fireworks and petrol bombs at the police and fire services. It’s the typical Tory response of course: more police, bigger fines, enlarge the prison estate. Tories never stand back and consider whether there might be something else behind this, not just “badness”.

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It has long ago been indisputably proven that income inequality, extreme poverty in a country whose millionaires are getting richer, is always correlated with societal problems and ineffective punitive responses. Tories are always tough on crime, but it’s their actions in increasing the wealth gap that are actively causing that crime.

Derek Ball
Bearsden