Despite its abolition in Britain five decades ago, opinion remains divided over the ethics and viability of the death penalty.<\/p>\n
Peter Anthony Allen and Gwynne Owen Evans were the last Britons to be executed, hanged in 1964 for the murder of John Alan West.<\/p>\n
In 1965, Labour MP Sydney Silverman, who was determined to abolish the penalty, introduced a Private Member\u2019s Bill to suspend death sentences. While no executions took place since, the death penalty was finally abolished in all circumstances in 1998.<\/p>\n
At the time, the majority of the population was in favor of abolition. However, recent opinion polls on capital punishment show views may be hardening once again.<\/p>\n
\nOpinion poll published last yr in UK showed 65% in favour of restoring death penalty, slightly higher in men & >55s. http:\/\/t.co\/yKIG7u5bO6<\/a><\/p>\n\u2013 louis appleby (@ProfLAppleby) May 28, 2013<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\nAccording to a YouGov poll published in 2014, British people \u201cstill tend to support<\/em>\u201d the reintroduction of the death penalty, by 45-39 percent.<\/p>\n\u201cThe Commons vote which ended capital punishment was a milestone for British justice, yet YouGov research finds it to be one of those issues where the views of the British public go against the political consensus<\/em>,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n\u201cBy 45-39 percent people tend to support the reintroduction of the death penalty for murder<\/em>,\u201d it added.<\/p>\nHowever, research published in the NatCen British Social Report in March found 48 percent of the 2,878 people surveyed are in favor of the punishment \u2014 the lowest figure since the survey began in 1983, when around 75 percent ruled in favor.<\/p>\n
Marking the 50th anniversary, Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron called for the penalty to be abolished globally.<\/p>\n
\n\n50 years ago today the death penalty was abolished for murder in the UK. We must keep campaigning to end it throughout the world.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Tim Farron (@timfarron) November 9, 2015<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\u201c50 years ago today the death penalty was abolished for murder in the UK. We must keep campaigning to end it throughout the world,\u201d he said on Twitter<\/em>.<\/p>\nHuman rights charity Reprieve is opposed to reconsidering the death penalty. \u201c50 years of abolition is something to be proud of \u2014 but we must not let the progress we have made as a nation in the last half century be reversed by our current government, which has presided over a series of changes that undermine Britain\u2019s commitment to human rights<\/em>,\u201d Reprieve said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\nSomething to celebrate. 50 yrs ago today Great Britain made the sensible and right decision in abolishing the #DeathPenalty<\/a><\/p>\n\u2013 Glyndwr Griffiths (@Di_Bach) November 9, 2015<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\nDear anyone who thinks the death penalty should be brought back to the UK, the Lee Rigby case is a very strong argument in favour #Raging<\/a><\/p>\n\u2013 Lorna (@Firecrackeruk) February 26, 2014<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\u201cThe Foreign Office has recently scrapped its death penalty abolition strategy, and removed \u2018countries of concern\u2019 like Saudi Arabia and China from its annual human rights reports.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cDavid Cameron is now openly prioritizing trade over human rights \u2014 even bidding for business with the Saudi prisons system, which would oversee the planned \u2018crucifixion\u2019 of young protestor Ali al Nimr<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cBritain used to be a leader when it came to opposition to the death penalty \u2014 we must not allow this government to put us in bed with the hangman<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\nVia RT<\/a>.\u00a0This piece was reprinted by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Despite its abolition in Britain five decades ago, opinion remains divided over the ethics and viability of the death penalty. Peter Anthony Allen and Gwynne Owen Evans were the last Britons to be executed, hanged in 1964 for the murder of John Alan West. In 1965, Labour MP Sydney Silverman, who was determined to abolish […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":198683,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-198682","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198682\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/198683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}