You should spend about 40 minutes on this task.
The only way to cut the crime rate is building more prisons and make prison sentences longer. To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion?
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
You should write at least 250 words.
Model Answer 1:
As we see nowadays the crime rate has increased comparatively and many people think that building more prisons and putting people inside for a long time will help to reduce the crime rate but actually this is not the solution in my opinion.
The first thing we need to do is to control the crime rate in the society by raising awareness in people and through positive media. The media has a very important role in raising awareness in common population through television and the Internet. The young generation is deeply influenced by the violence based movies and such movies should not me made instead positive messages should be given to the innocent minds so that tomorrow they become the useful citizens.
Another important issue is the increased use of unlicensed weapons openly in society as it is seen commonly now that on small issues people lose their tempers and don’t hesitate in using guns. At the same time, security should be increased at society level like in small towns and other neglected places and security automobiles number should also be increased.
The idea of increasing the prison number and holding the criminals long time inside is not a very sensible idea because it is observed that people start making organised gangs inside the jails and sometimes become big criminals than they were ever before. Instead of wasting this money on extending the prison system Government should invest this money on beneficial plans for a nation like constructing modern hospitals, improving the pre-existing health sector and giving better education standards.
To sum up , raising awareness can make a remarkable difference in people’s attitude and can decline the crime rates. this is a far better approach than increasing the number of prisons and prolonging the punishment period.
[ Written by – Asima Iram ]
Sample Answer 2:
It is believed that the best way to reduce crime is by adding more prisons and making the detention period longer. To a certain point, I would agree with the idea but it is not the only way, as there are other alternatives that government could do to reduce the crime rate.
On the one hand, some people believe that by building more prisons and making a stricter detention period, it will be possible to reduce the number of crime activities. It is hoped that people will think twice before they do some criminal acts, as there are a lot of available rooms in prisons, and they could be sentenced for such a long period. For example, if the government set new regulation whereas bank robbers will be punished for a thirty-five years period of detention, then it is expected that people who plan to do this will consider all the consequences for a number of times before they rob a bank.
However, the government should notice that adding more prisons and setting a longer detention period is not the only way, as it should be integrated with other plans as well. In the common case, people do crimes because they have less skill, no money and unemployed, and as a consequence, they do some crimes for survival. Besides of the above-mentioned plan, the government should also provide skill training for low skill residents, therefore they could enter the workplace and would not think about doing some crime activities. And then, the government should also provide job opportunities for ex-prisoners, as in the general case, many of them were not accepted by the public and consequently, they returned to the crime world again.
In conclusion, to a certain extent, I agree that building more prisons and extending the sentence period would be a good plan for lowering the crime rate. But, it should also be combined with other plans such as providing skill course for the poor and create some works for ex-convicts, therefore the plan would run effectively.
[ Written by – Darwin Lesmana ]