Nigel Farage is a minority in his own party when it comes to the death penalty. In August 2014 he declared that he is against the penalty, but thinks “we should be free to debate it”. In contrast, UKIP MEP Louise Bours called for its reinstatement on the 50th anniversary of the last hanging in Britain. 75% of UKIP supporters back the death penalty, according to the 2015 edition of the British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey.
Support for the death penalty is declining among the general public. For the first time, a majority of the population as a whole are against it – only 48% are now in favour, compared to 75% in 1983.
The graph shows how far participants in the BSA survey from 2000 to 2012 agreed with the statement “For some crimes, the death penalty is the most appropriate sentence”. How far did people of different religious affiliations agree?
We can see that there was a significant level of support for the death penalty among all groups over the period.
Anglicans were most consistently in favour of the death penalty, with a clear majority supporting it in each year. In 2012 61% agreed it was appropriate in some circumstances, down from a high of 68% in 2005.
Those of no religious affiliation were the second most likely group to support the death penalty over the period, with 56% agreeing in 2012. As with Anglicans, in each year a majority of the non-religious were in favour.
Those of non-Christian religions tended overall to show the least level of agreement with the statement, but their responses fluctuated widely, reaching lows of 40% in 2001 and 38% in 2004 but climbing higher in more recent years. It should be noted that the small sample size of this group may have influenced these oscillations.
Nonconformists and Catholics sat in between these poles, variously showing majorities in agreement or disagreement with the death penalty.
On this particular issue, then, Anglicans and the non-religious are the most likely groups to be sympathetic to Louise Bours' views. British Catholics, on the other hand, may be closer to Pope Francis’ position on the matter.
This socio-political statement is one of several asked by the BSA survey to determine where groups sit on the 'Libertarian-Authoritarian' axis:
• People who break the law should be given stiffer sentences
• For some crimes, the death penalty is the most appropriate sentence
• Young people today don’t have enough respect for traditional British values
• Schools should teach children to obey authority
• Censorship of films and magazines is necessary to uphold moral standards
• The law should always be obeyed, even if a particular law is wrong
See where each group sits on the overall Libertarian-Authoritarian axis here
This snippet taken from our report on Voting and Values in Britain: Does religion count? (pp. 88-89).
See the full report here and an Executive Summary here for further analysis of voting behaviour and religious identity.
Data source: British Social Attitudes 2000-2012
Individual traditions within the 'Other Christian' and 'Other religion' categories are grouped together within the BSA data due to small sample sizes.
