Southport Child Slayings Reignites Debate on UK’s Abolition of The Death Penalty

The jailing of Axel Rudakubana — who rushed into a children’s party and tried to kill everyone inside, ultimately murdering three young girls — but not even for a full-life sentence has triggered a debate on legal reform.

Prominent Reform UK party Member of Parliament Rupert Lowe responded to the sentencing of 18-year-old Axel Rudakubana on Thursday to say the killings call for a national debate about the United Kingdom having abolished the death penalty. Rudakubana was sentenced to a minimum of 52 years for the murder of three young children, the attempted murder of eight young children, the attempted murder of two adults, and possession of a knife, the creation of a biotoxin, and possession of an Al-Qaeda manual.

Rudakubana stormed into a children’s party and attempted to murder those inside with extreme violence just days before his 18th birthday. Had he been 18 at the time of the attack, he would have been legally liable for, and would almost certainly have been sentenced to, what is called in the United Kingdom a whole life order. This extremely rare order distinguishes a sentence ordering the inmate to actually spend his whole life in prison from the misleadingly named life sentence, where the criminal could spend their whole life in prison but would actually be liable for release after a set number of years, if they can persuade a parole board.

In Rudakubana’s case, because he was not quite an adult by a few days, he was sentenced to a minimum term of  52 years. This contrasts to the United States, for instance, where in some cases 17-year-olds who commit particularly abhorrent crimes can be tried as full adults, and where in some states attempting to murder an entire class of young children would invite the death penalty.

Even Britain’s politically milquetoast parties at least conceded the case suggested the United Kingdom’s legal system might need some reform in the face of such violence, which despite its familiar characteristics and the presence of a terrorism conviction the nation’s prosecutor absolutely refuses to call terrorism.

Labour MP Patrick Hurley called the sentence “unduly lenient” and said he had referred the matter to the Attorney General for review. The UK AG can overrule a judge in such cases, and the present incumbent Lord Hermer has been battered by successive waves of bad press in recent weeks over allegations that he is deeply partisan and possibly unfit for office, so intervening in this case could be perceived as a easy means to buy himself a good news cycle.

The Times of London states the Conservatives have also suggested the case might presage change, with party leader Kemi Badenoch saying there was a “strong case” to consider a whole life order for Rudakubana.

But these vague assertions were handily drowned out by calls from Reform’s Rupert Lowe, who questioned whether in such a case a return to hanging wasn’t worth discussing. He wrote: “It is my opinion that now is the time for a national debate on the use of the death penalty in exceptional circumstances. This is an exceptional circumstance.”

A previous Labour government abolished the death penalty in functionally all cases in the 1960s and the last people hung by the state were in 1964. Yet public opinion wasn’t in favour of abolishing hanging then, and a majority supported bringing it back for decades afterwards.

Although polling on this matter is not frequently undertaken — given it is something politicians very rarely wish to talk about — what research there is suggests in the 21st century it is still the case more Britons want to bring back hanging then keep it banned.

There are shades of opinion on the matter of execution. Reform leader Nigel Farage has previously said he is against capital punishment, stating in 2014 “I have my reservations about the state having the power to end someone’s life”. Farage’s position appears to flow from the notion, common among many that would support capital punishment otherwise, that the state and legal system is too incompetent to be trusted to get it right every time.