"I've long thought we should charge them according their wealth / income for their "board and lodgings" while serving at the pleasure of Her Majesty?"The problem there is who sets the scale, who decides who pays and who doesn't, what if you want to 'buy' a bit more comfort...It's prison, not a market, the aim is retribution and rehabilitation, not board and lodging.In this case it's likely Rolf Harris will be writing a lot of cheques - his own legal expenses, the prosecution costs (read the sentencing) and quite probably damages to his victims. I'm happy to pay tuppence for his porridge as long as the victims get some sort of restitution.Going back to the original point, it's a bad idea to have retrospective sentencing because it's a bad idea to allow the government the power to create laws criminalising you in the past. All the 'well, Harris would have got x years today' forgets to note that the offences carrying that punishment didn't exist in 1980.
Thomas Barry ● 4455d