Consequences

Don't do the crime if you are not prepared to do the time, used to be the old maxim before various ministers tried to find ways to cut corners and reduce the prison population rather than build more prisons, though frequently enough they were prepared to let any prisoners out early violent or not. Yet what happens if there is no real penalty for committing a crime?

Express.

MORE than 10,000 yobs have snubbed anti-social behaviour orders, it was revealed yesterday.
Government figures show 56 per cent of Asbos issued between 1999 – when they were introduced by Labour – and 2009 have been breached.
It found 45,599 Asbos were flouted across England and Wales between June 2000 and December 2009.
In 2009 – the latest year for which statistics are available – 1,671 Asbos were issued and 1,133 broken. Officials found that one Asbo – often imposed to control the behaviour of thuggish street yobs – was breached more than four times on average.

I can't imagine what was going on in the heads of labour politicians other than this is a cheap (and unsupervised) way of dealing with the odd thug who they didn't want clogging up the prison/remand/probation system. It wasn't even an effective slap on the wrist as 56% of those given them simply ignored them, it just added an extra layer between the courts and prison. Inevitably it was used for things it was never designed for, as well as ridiculous lengths of time it often applied for.
If we are going to deal with criminals and anti social behaviour then the punishment has to be such that the offenders will not wish to re-offend. I'm not saying that persistent littering should carry a death penalty or any such, but that those who do it and get caught should not simply get told not to do it again or else. Not even kids are fooled by that one, it's what's known to them as an empty threat, nor am I suggesting birching or flogging, though in certain instances I could see it having an effect, however as the human rights act and various do-gooders would go into apoplexy over really punishing criminals they aren't options (yet) The answer I believe would be hard tough but short sentences, up at 6, made to run or jog to every task (mundane stuff), basic food, no tv, no interaction and early to bed. Most kids wouldn't know what had hit them and probably wouldn't want to do it again, that said, others might have better ideas and would no doubt work far better than an ASBO.
Certainly something needs to be done if the figures are anything to go by.