LAST week saw the shameful scene of Labour publishing an attack ad that claimed that Rishi Sunak does not care about protecting children or jailing paedophiles. The ad appalled many, including Labour supporters — such behaviour is expected from the Tories but Labour is meant to be better. The ad was rightly and heavily criticised as dirty politics that exploited abused children.

It was also inaccurate and misleading. The Tories are an appalling party of government, but sentences are decided by the courts, not by Sunak — and the sentencing guidelines were not written in the short period since he took over as Prime Minister. As former chief prosecutor Nazir Afzal put it: “There are a thousand reasons to attack the Tories on a broken criminal justice system better than one that Rishi Sunak doesn’t control.”

The Labour campaign tweet was also hypocritical, as Keir Starmer as director of public prosecutions had played a central role in setting sentencing recommendations.