Justice system serving addicts badly

May I congratulate The Times on last Friday's excellent editorial on restorative justice.

We know that our so-called "correctional facilities" are full of young people who have a drug-related problem and that very little is being done to cure or alleviate this malaise. Many of these young addicts just wait until they have served their time, often continuing to indulge in in their bad, destructive habit and then go back to prison after a few months of leaving.

Way back in the 1980s I tried hard, with one test case, to open the eyes of our justice system especially where people have been taken to court again after years of a rehabilitation programmes, managed to control their addiction, find work and built a family.

In most cases our judicial system is vindictive and aims at the deterrent rather than the restorative justice, which is so often applied in other countries. Here, the latter is the exception to the rule. We urgently need to establish a specialist drug court and employ more qualified personnel in this area so that those who enter a prison cell once will never go back to it again.

This is not only Christian thinking but humanitarian and in the best interest of the common good.