AMAZING, isn't it - how the response to wrong 'uns is to reward them for their bad behaviour?

The latest instance of official wheedling and appeasement comes from Hyndburn Council among whose ideas for dealing with troublesome louts hurling abuse at players and staff using the pitches at the borough's sports centre at Church - to the extent that people fear for their safety - is giving them a pitch of their own.

Just what will that teach them - other than that if they keep it up, they might be showered with even more bribes?

It's yet another instance of the pathetic kid-glove stuff that pervades the thinking of the authorities when it comes to dealing with young yobs - the ludicrous business of sending offenders on safari holidays and, as we have seen in East Lancashire, giving free driving lessons to kids hooked on car crime.

If such ideas worked, the proof of them would be trouble-free neighbourhoods, not ones like they have in Hyndburn, likened to 'war zones' by its MP.

Why not try throwing the book at the yobs and slapping anti-social behaviour orders of them?

Or is being tough on crime and nuisance simply a slogan?