THE CAUSES OF CRIME.

Southland Times, Issue 19330, 15 September 1921, Page 4

THE CAUSES OF CRIME.

A remarkable statement on the causes of crime occurs in the recently published study of the English prison system by Sir Evelyn Ruggles-Brise, who has been chairman of the Prison Commission for England and Wales and is president of the International Prison Commission. In the course of an arresting preface Sir Evelyn RugglesBrise, who is in a position to speak with authority, deals with the influence of social conditions on crime and he says some interesting things. All our political and social reforms, he says, react on the state of crime and any step taken in the direction of making people more contented and of keeping them occupied tend to lessen the amount of law-breaking in the community. Better housing and lighting, control of the liquor traffic, cheap food, fair wages, insurance, village clubs, boy scouts and healthy sports all exert an influence on the incentive to crime and therefore repay the nation with “invisible benefits.” It is interesting to notice, however, that this prison authority draws especial attention to the importance of controlling the liquor traffic and of reducing unemployment. The lessons of the war, he says, should not be forgotten. All the legislation of the past century directed to changes in the penal code or the methods of punishment did not affect what social legislation, induced by the war and affecting the daily habit and living of the people, revealed during the five years from 1914 to 1919 —a reduction in the number entering prison by 75 per cent. It must be admitted, of course, that a large number of men were out of the country, but compared with the population this number was not large and certainly could not of itself account for the immense reduction in the number of people sent to prison. Sir Evelyn Ruggles-Brise has other explanations:

When employment is easy and plentiful, and when at the same time there is severe restriction of the opportunities for spending wages in intoxicating drink, there is the probability that the record of crime would be very low in the community.

Drunkenness, according to Sir Evelyn, is the cause of one-third of all the receptions into the prisons and alcohol is a contributing factor in about 50 per cent, of the offences committed in a year. From such a man this statement is impressive, confirming as it does the evidence of other authorities in a position to know. It is, therefore, not surprising to find Sir Evelyn saying: “To legislate against drink is indirectly to legislate againsi crime.” But be might also have added that to reduce unemployment is to reduce crime, for unemployment plays its evil part in augmenting the burden of crime in the community.