The Deputy will appreciate that this matter is one for the courts which are, subject only to the Constitution and the law, independent in the exercise of their judicial functions. It is not open to me to comment on or intervene in any way with the conduct or decision of any individual court case which is a matter entirely for the presiding judge. This is a long-standing principle of our system of justice and it would not be appropriate for me to comment on the type of sanctions being imposed by the courts. While it is much less costly to apply a non-custodial sanction, involving supervision of the offender in a community setting, it has to be borne in mind that non-custodial sanctions are simply not a suitable or adequate way of dealing with many offenders who come before the courts.
Supervision in the community is also used by me as Minister, albeit only in a small number of cases, to have persons released from prison in special circumstances supervised by the probation and welfare service rather than serve out the full term of their sentence. In these cases, the person's motivation to remain crime free and the level of risk he or she poses to the community can enable me to consider him or her suitable for integration into the community under the supervision of the probation and welfare service and strictly on condition that he or she will be returned to prison in the event of non-compliance with the terms of his or her release.