Letter: Perhaps he's back on planet Earth

OPINION: Your article highlighting the sentencing gap between the powerful and rich and the underprivileged highlights an issue that most of us are well aware of but are bewildered as to its cause.

It seems to be yet another example of the bizarre, inconsistent and logically flawed set of ideas that make up our justice system.

Almost as inconsistent are the views of Kim Workman, director of Rethinking Crime and Punishment, a Christian-based group set up to have political influence in the area of crime and justice. He stated that an example should have been made of former National MP Roger McClay and "we need to realise that the powerful of this word need to be punished just as enthusiastically as the powerless".

Is this the same man who wrote an article, published in The Dominion Post this time last year, promoting alternatives to prison for criminals and advocating restorative justice ideas based around peacemaking and forgiveness rather than retribution? He seems to have lost his Christian sense of forgiveness over the course of 12 months for some reason.

Or maybe he's seen the light and decided to come back down to Planet Earth.

CHRIS HALL

Palmerston North

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