Tories call for 'neighbourly society'

Shadow home secretary Oliver Letwin today overhauled Conservative thinking on law and order.

He called for a "neighbourly society" to stop youngsters turning to crime by offering them support and "kindly discipline".

In a significant shift from the hardline rhetoric on punishment preferred by his predecessors, he will use a key speech tonight to accept that some children need help learning virtuous habits, to escape the conveyor belt of criminality.

The speech to Right-wing think-tank the Centre for Policy Studies marks a turning point because it suggests that society has a role in shaping criminal behaviour.

The move spells the final abandonment by the Conservatives of Margaret Thatcher's old mantra that there was no such thing as society, a philosophy Labour ministers pointed out was fashioned while Mr Letwin was a Downing Street policy adviser.

Mr Letwin became a victim of crime himself last week when he allowed a man into his south London home to use the lavatory and was forced to chase him down the street as he made off with jewellery and his wallet.

He said he hoped it would be possible to create the kind of society "where it was not naive to let someone into your home to use the loo".

Tonight he will say that young people need the chance to participate in a neighbourly society. Every individual has a clear choice, but some need help making the right decisions to avoid the "conveyor belt" which leads to a life of crime.

Trouble begins with lack of family support, rolls on through problems at school, drugs, petty crime, serious crime, prison, repeated offending and finally hardened, organised criminality, he will say. Senior Tory sources said the speech did not mean the party was going "soft" on crime. The neighbourly society meant taking action against drug barons and organised criminals as well as developing a "cycle of responsibility".

"This means making neighbourhoods safe for children to play in, towing away abandoned cars, removing rubbish, repairing playgrounds, pushing out drug dealers."