Rishi Sunak wants to make the country & our readers’ lives better – but the clock is ticking

More, Rishi

FOR years The Sun has railed against the feebleness of our justice system.

A system which routinely sets hardened criminals free early, sometimes at grave risk to the public.

A system which lets offenders facing jail choose whether to attend their own sentencing — allowing them to cock one final snook at their victims and our courts.

It has taken the Tories too long to put both right. But we applaud that they now will.

Automatic whole-life terms for the most heinous murderers, and no reduction in sentences for rapists and some others, are what the public demands.

So is the simple justice of forcing ­villains to face the music in court.

This crime crackdown was the highlight of yesterday’s King’s Speech, setting out Rishi Sunak’s plans before the next election.

But we hugely welcome too his common sense on Net Zero.

Sane politicians know we will need oil and gas for decades yet.

It would be crazy NOT to extract our own secure supplies from the North Sea, as the Tories accept.

Yet that IS Labour’s position.

Left-wing ideological fantasy always trumps reality with Keir Starmer’s energy chief Ed Miliband.

In his muddled mind, imports from flaky dictators are a better path to Net Zero.

Starmer’s faith in this proven dud is mystifying.

The rest of the Tories’ speech was solid enough.

But there was no game-changer on house-building, a big miss.

Nor any mention of Pumpwatch, the simple monitoring scheme we back to lower petrol prices.

Meanwhile three paramount issues for voters — the economy, immigration and NHS — were effectively ducked.

NHS reform seems a non-starter for the Tories.

Small boat migrants cannot be meaningfully tackled until the Supreme Court approves the Rwanda scheme.

And on the cost of living the PM and Chancellor seem merely to be hoping for more positive news, perhaps allowing for tax cuts.

Rishi wants to convince the public he is the “change” candidate who will make the country — and our readers’ lives — better.

The clock is ticking.

Loopy law

THE Leveson-era law aimed at neutering the Press is one of the maddest in history.

Section 40 of the 2013 Crime and Courts Act has never been enacted — but it would mean publishers paying the entire costs of libel or privacy actions against them, even if they won.

The only escape would be to join the state-backed regulator which no self-respecting news organisation wants to touch.

Not even The Guardian.

It is a law backed only by weird Hacked Off obsessives hoping to settle decades-old scores.

The Tories are dead right to repeal it. It is a sinister absurdity with no public benefit.