It could be just the way the Thunderer is reporting it especially as it is based on a sneak preview of the recommendations of a report we can't see yet, but there seems to be something missing from this.
I could cite an imperial shed-load of research on how treating people's drug addiction reduces both crime and re-offending rates, but I would end up linking to pretty much half of the crime and victims section of homeoffice.gov.uk so I won't. So given that the home office has all this research as to how effective all this is why are the leaks of Lord Carter's review of prisons suggesting that women will be getting treatment programmes and less time behind bars rather than all prisoners?
The other thing I noticed as I leafed through Uncle Bulgaria's favourite read during some dead time yesterday was this article about The Kingdom. I read it and half of me wanted to join in the praise being heaped on the film makers for having a sympathetic Arab character played by an Arab. But while it is a step down the right route, the fact that the actor is a Christian Israeli suggests to me that there is a good long way before Hollywood actually gets to a truly inclusive place. I shall go back to hiding the fact that I occasionally still read the Times in that special place for dark secrets, before I reveal an unhealthy attachment to *cough* the writings of Caitlin Moran