If we all got a penny paid every time a silver-tongued barrister made excuses for a defendant in court, we would all be rich beyond the dreams of Croesus.

There's a litany of threadbare excuses and sob stories one regularly hears in courts up and down the land.

There was no exception at Worcester Crown Court when dangerous driver Harry Milton-Hossak was given a suspended sentence for leading police on a high speed chase through Worcester, hurtling past a school as children walked home feet away.

Yes, he’s young. Yes, everyone deserves a second chance. But this is someone already convicted of burglary, battery, witness intimidation, theft, harassment, sending threatening messages and having a blade in public. Still he wasn’t jailed.

He has been given third, fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh chances. A cat doesn’t have this many lives.

Some judges do not live on the same planet as the rest of us. Criminals thrive upon the indulgence of society and especially on the well-meaning leniency of the judiciary.