SHOULD life mean life?

For the perpetrators of the most serious crimes, murder, rape, terrorism, how long is long enough spent behind prison walls or should they never see the outside world again?

Every so often a crime is committed that shocks and repulses not only those directly affected but the wider community and nation.

When someone is found guilty of the crime then there are understandably calls for the strongest punishment to be administered.

READ MORE:Tories call for whole life sentences

The names of the innocent victims become forever linked in the public consciousness with the name of their killer.

All too often the victims are female, often young, often children.

Alesha Macphail, Paige Doherty, Angelika Kluk, Moira Jones, Jodie Jones.

Not always female though, Barry Wallace’s murder was brutal and sickened the nation.

You can go back further to Susan Maxwell, Caroline Hogg, Christine Eadie and Helen Scott.

Further still to Patricia Docker, Jemima McDonald and Helen Puttock whose killer, or killers, has never been identified.

All those men convicted of the above crimes received life sentences, as is mandatory for murder and lengthy punishment parts before they can be considered for parole.

In one case, Angus Sinclair, he received the longest time so far set before he could be considered for release, at 37 years.

READ MORE: Alesha Macphail killer has sentence reduced

Another, Robert Black received 35 years.

Black died in prison.

Sinclair also died in prison. He was jailed for life for a series of rapes and later convicted of three murders.

His first killing was decades earlier though, when he was 16 and he served six years for killing a seven year old girl.

The argument is that had life meant life, then Sinclair would not have been free to kill three more women and rape several times because he would have been locked away for the rest of his natural life.

For the families of his later victims it can understandably be an appealing argument.

The Tories have a Bill, that they want the Scottish Government to support, that would introduce an option available to judges of imposing a whole life sentence.

The Conservatives will find plenty of support for their Bill.

They are going about it by claiming the SNP are presiding over a “soft touch” justice system.

That the current Government wants to empty the jails and are putting the rights of criminals before victims.

It is a well-worn political tactic, usually by Conservative politicians to attack those they see as liberal.

It also plays on the fears of the population where perception of crime can be higher than the actuality.

It ignores the role of prison as a tool of rehabilitation where possible.

And it wilfully ignores the fact that sentences can be set that mean that someone will likely die before they can be considered for release and also that assessments of whether they still pose a risk are made before anyone on a life sentence is considered for release.

Scotland also has proportionately more people serving life sentences than most nations, casting doubt on the soft touch tag.

Crime and punishment has long been a political battleground with calls for ever tougher sentences and claims that prisons are holiday camps.

I’ve never been in jail nor have I stayed at Butlins but I doubt I would confuse one for the other.

Some people, like Sinclair and Black, were rightly never released and spent the rest of their life in jail.

However, whether a Whole Life Sentence, had it been available to the judge when he sentenced the 16 year Angus Sinclair to ten years in 1961, would have been used is debatable, but unlikely.

And thankfully, people like Sinclair and Black are very rare.

Punishment has to be severe enough to serve justice for victims and society and act as a deterrent but has to be balanced with the principle of rehabilitation.

I suppose that is what we have an independent judiciary for.