[jambutty]

A motorist was given 56 days Intermittent Custodial Sentence because he moved a 40 mph speed limit sign to a 30 mph area in an attempt to fool the speed camera that had trapped him twice in one day.

When did an Intermittent Custodial Sentence become law?

It would appear that this law came into being around September 2004 and basically it states:

Intermittent custody should only be imposed if a custodial sentence of less than 12 months is justified and neither a community sentence nor suspended sentence is appropriate.

Towards the end of the last century the usual arguments raged about prison population and criminals getting light sentences because of prison overcrowding when it occurred to me that the answer might lie in a system that was in force in Capetown, South Africa in the early sixties and as far as I know is still in use today.

In 1998 I wrote to Jack Straw who was my MP at the time because I lived in Blackburn to outline what they did in South Africa. I never got a reply but maybe it my letter just sowed a seed.

A shipmate, or maybe that should be a shore establishment mate because we were both at a transmitting station miles out in the bush, got done for drunken driving. He was awarded, if that is the right word, 300 hours Intermittent Custodial Sentence, although I don’t think that it was called that at the time.

What it meant was that he would have to spend a total of 300 hours in jail within a 12 months period. He could choose when to go to jail providing that the period would be in multiples of 12 hours with a minimum of 48 hours at a time. Prisoners on this scheme would have to be at the prison gates between 0700 and 0800 or 1900 and 2000 by prior arrangement.

Any prisoner smelling of alcohol or under the influence of drugs would be turned away and the period ‘booked’ would be added to the sentence. Similarly if a prisoner did not turn up at the appointed time or was late, that period would also be added to the sentence.

There were stringent penalties for repeat offences that led to full time prison.

When a prisoner ‘booked’ in he or even she would be required to change into prison clothes under supervision and the street clothes would be locked away. During the term in prison, prisoners would not have any access to the radio except twice a day to listen to the news. There was no TV then but if there had been I guess that the ban would have applied to TV as well. Prisoners would work in the prison laundry and kitchens as well as scrubbing out their cells and communal space. The only reading material that was allowed was the Bible or Koran etc. or technical manuals relating to the job the prisoner was employed in. Any free time could be spent chatting in the communal space until 10:00pm when the prisoners were locked in their own cells for the night. Part time prisoners had no access to full time residents.

My mate had a vicar as a companion, a managing director of a major Capetown company, a bank manager and sundry senior management as well as a good selection of ‘ordinary’ workers. Most were in for various motoring offences.

My mate’s reaction well before his prison terms was up was, “Never again!”

The advantage of this scheme is that an offender would not only be punished as required by law but also would be able to keep his job and maintain his family whilst spending weekends and holidays in prison.