Channel 4 hosts live debate on riots

Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith joined a panel including Labour MP Hilary Benn, business owner Adrian Mills and Paul Gladstone Reid who works with young people in Tottenham to talk about the causes of the riots and suggest possible solutions to the problems they highlighted.

One audience member suggested that a cause of the violence was “the decimation of youth services”.

A YouGov poll carried out for the programme found that most people blamed poor parenting, gangs and criminality for the riots.

But there were some negative responses to the Government’s suggestion of eviction for the families of any council house tenants convicted of riot-related offences. UK-based youth worker Twilight Bey, who is from the US, said that in Los Angeles this policy has led to children as young as six months old having to live on the streets.

The debate as it happened: Street riots live blog

The audience was drawn from Birmingham, Nottingham, London and Manchester, which all saw violent disturbances. Many had their own stories including one man who said when he challenged a looter who was unloading stolen goods on his doorstep he was threatened with having his house set on fire.

Magistrate: for first offenders we have one option

Also in the audience was magistrate Rob Butler who works in Ealing. He said that in terms of punishments, if someone is before the court for a first offence, essentially he can only give them a “referral order”.

MP Hilary Benn had another suggestion as to what should be done to punish rioters. He said that people involved should be forced to join in the clean-up operation to face up to what they had done.

But there were also some more positive things to have come from the disorder. Many speakers said that seeing communities pull together had been encouraging.

Mr Duncan Smith said that the riots had proved to him that there exists a real problem and as for solutions, he said: “You have to create a community where there is responsibility”.