You would be forgiven for thinking that 30 years after the last major round of riots in London, the government had learned a thing or two from its (Conservative) predecessor.

But you would be wrong.

While those best acquainted with the culprits – youth workers and members of the community – were careful not to draw any conclusions in the first days of rioting, the Prime Minister knew within hours of his return from a Tuscan holiday, just what kind of problem he was facing.

The first hint that his promise of “swift justice” might be amiss, was that various parts of the capital had already been burning for two nights.

More worryingly, the PM hasn’t seemed terribly keen to find out why people took a sudden interest in making Molotov cocktails and setting things on fire.

He said the behaviour of these young miscreants was simply “sickening” – a fair enough start if you wish to proceed to a more reasoned diagnosis.

But he didn’t.

It was the beginning and end of the kind of sanctimonious proclamation to which we are becoming accustomed on both sides of the Atlantic. In North America the hollow ring of right-wing carnival barkers dismissing all and sundry as “liberal”, “evil” or “socialist” is all too familiar.

But until recently, British public debate seemed somewhat more sophisticated – parliament notwithstanding.

Mere hours after Cameron’s return, the government authorised the use of water cannons – all but useless in the face of fast-moving rioters – as well as plastic bullets, which have never been used in England, for good reason.

Luckily the bobbies finally did what they (usually) do well: they gained control of looters using minimal force and made arrests up and down the country – more than 2,000 in just over a week.

But judges then set to work with frightful fervour. In courts that operated round the clock, they issued sentences that were vastly out of step with the crimes committed.

Two young men had posted messages on facebook inviting people to join them for a riot in the (under-performing) north of England. The only people to come were the police, who promptly arrested them.  In short order, the lads were given four years for organising a riot that never happened.

A college student who wandered into a looted supermarket to steal a case of bottled water was given six months in prison.

A mother of two was given a five month sentence after receiving a pair of shorts that had been stolen during the riots. She has since launched the first successful appeal. The judge set aside Ursula Nevin’s prison term and assigned her community service work instead.

There are likely to be many more such appeals, clogging up the already congested courts.

The bewigged brethren got so carried away giving hard time to facebook crooks that they’ve pushed the prison population even closer to capacity.

Some 86,000 places are filled, with only 1,000 or so places to spare. Anyone unlucky enough to get rough justice now could be looking at time in the Tower.

No country in Western Europe imprisons more of its population than England and Wales.

But wait – there’s more.

Competing with looters, traffickers of contraband shorts, and the vigilantes and reactionary judges who chase them, is the armchair policy-maker, who knows just how to sort it all out.

More than 100,000 people have signed a petition calling for rioters to lose their social assistance.

So let’s get this straight.

Angry, unpredictable youths living in areas with high unemployment have calmed down for long enough to be told they’ll be stripped of what little money they get.

Now, added to the toxic mix that created widespread, deadly rioting in the first place, is the prospect of even deeper poverty.

Let’s see how that goes.