REGARDING the Lads Army way to better men, as depicted in the TV documentary series.

Having read Gary McNulty's letter concerning the television programme "Lads Army", I am in full agreement with his sentiments. I am absolutely certain that he is spot on. The so-called "punishments" that are dished out by the magistrates and the Judiciary in general are appallingly laughable. Having worked all my life, and paid my dues and demands, as others of my generation have, surely we should be able to expect the magistrates and the Judiciary to mete out punishments to the miscreants that fit the crime? I am deliberately exempting the police from my criticism. It must be heartbreaking for them to bring the culprits to court, time and time again, having had to sort out all the paperwork involved, only for the "poor, spotty-faced loved one" to get a pat on the head, or a smack on the wrist, from people who ought to know better. The police should be there to police, which is what they are paid for, not to do the office work. When we had the old Bolton Borough Police Force, civilian staff did all the paperwork, but I can already hear the accountants' sharp intake of breath as they come out with that old, hackneyed phrase "We couldn't afford to employ civilians".

The so-called "Do Gooders" have had their way for far too long, and the majority of the law abiding citizens of this country know all too well that their "softly softly" approach to punishments do not work. Do they live on another planet? Does it not affect them when an elderly pensioner is battered to the floor or murdered?

The next thing that will become law in England is the parents not being able to smack their child. I emphasise "smack" and not hit. But I have no doubt whatsoever, that some clever Social Worker will say that a child has "Human Rights". That may be so, but so have other people. For example, the victims of the crimes that some of these "poor little darlings" commit. Whatever happened to the "Three strikes and you're out"? If the people in so-called authority really wanted to cut the crime rate at a stroke, they could do it by implementing this. It worked in New York. The "Do Gooders" of this country have ruined it for the decent, law abiding people, and the criminals, from a very young age up to the habitual hard criminal, are laughing all the way to their next job.

Gary McNulty has got it right. Send the tearaways to a 1950s-style camp and subject them to a couple of years of tough, and not always "fair" discipline, with no get-outs. The fact that one or two of the volunteers for the programme could not "hack it" and absconded said a lot about the younger generation of today. National Service, although I am not advocating its universal return, made better citizens of the youth and young men of the 1950s than it destroyed, and we had more respect for people and their possessions.

Jack Sinclair

Ex-R.E.M.E. (Airborne)

Rawson Road, Bolton