Where Now for European Social Democracy? - Policy Network

DAVID BLUNKETT 81There is a vast amount of accumulated wisdom in our laws andlegal system. But at the same time, we must accept that theydeveloped for most of their history in a time where there were nointernational terrorists, no suicide bombers – for whom, unlikeordinary offenders, the prospect of punishment is irrelevant – no DNAevidence which could identify guilty parties long after the crime hadtaken place, and so on. These are the circumstances we have to facetoday in protecting society and enforcing basic rights and duties. Wemust adapt and develop our systems of justice and security, whilecontinuing to ensure that our philosophy and principles develop in away that is both responsive to the new environment and faithful to ourcentral vision of freedom.I believe that there is a wider challenge in adapting theseprinciples than simply to amend our laws and powers. As government,we will only be able to make our system of justice effective, anddeliver freedom in its widest sense, if we demonstrate that we can usethe power vested in us responsibly, and gain the trust of the public.That is why, alongside our legal developments, we have embarkedupon a programme of fundamental reform and investment across thepublic sector, including the courts, the police, our prisons, immigrationservice and support for communities. We are striving to make theseservices more efficient – for example with better systems performancemonitoring for the police and enormous investments in informationtechnologies to make our court systems work better – but also moreresponsive to the needs of the communities they serve. We aredeveloping community justice courts, which give people moreunderstanding of and confidence in how the system works for them,and youth referral panels which involve communities in dealing withoffenders, empowering them and enabling people to be part of thesolution.International progress requires co-operation not competitionI have talked about how responding to new challenges in the areas ofpolicing and justice requires us to engage local communities. But italso requires us to make new connections in another direction, on the