Blackpool South MP Scott Benton has appeared on a live debate on GBNews hosted by journalist Dan Wootton offering his views on ‘Should the death penalty be reintroduced for child killers’.

MP Benton argued that, for particularly heinous cases where there is irrefutable evidence, the death penalty would be appropriate. His view is that for too long politicians and the media have dodged the debate on the death penalty and on justice more broadly. He stated that it is clear from YouGov polls that the current system does not reflect popular opinion and is not considered justice by many.

A different view was presented by Criminal Barrister & Civil Rights Lawyer (pictured on the right of photograph), who held an opposing opinion despite her own mother being tragically murdered.

At the end of the debate 80% of viewers backed the Blackpool South MP’s stance in the post debate poll.

Your can see the ten-minute debate here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0QJDi13qR0

The debate was the catalyst for much further discussion. One commentator said: ‘My problem is that what at the time is considered ‘irrefutable’ can later be ‘refutable’, because of advances in science etc. And there are occasions where people have been forced to give confessions or where evidence has been tampered or lost by police. These things are rare but they do happen and history has showed they result in miscarriages of justice. You can release someone from prison in these circumstances, but you can’t bring them back to life. I don’t feel we can ever have absolute confidence that wrongful convictions won’t happen and so life imprisonment would be safer. And some would argue a permanent loss of freedom is far greater punishment.’

Another said: ‘The death penalty is not “justice”, it is revenge. None of the evidence points to a deterrent effect, many interviews with families of crime victims do not describe feeling better or “closure” once the death penalty is carried out, and, in many cases in the USA, overall costs of the death penalty (when factoring in appeals etc) are higher than lifetime imprisonment. Given that the death penalty fails on all three of its stated objectives, it serves no purpose at all other than revenge, which is a dangerous route for the “justice” system to start down. We left medieval times a long time ago. Let’s keep it that way.’