The former prime minister Sir John Major has suggested the UK need not be banging up quite so many people. Lamenting the highest incarceration rates in western Europe, Sir John said he found it ‘hard to believe we British are uniquely criminal’. Of particular concern, he argued, was the sheer volume of non-violent offenders who end up behind bars: of the 43,000 people imprisoned between 2021 and 2022, more than 60 per cent had committed crimes with no element of violence.