Arguments: 1. Mandatory minimum sentences increase the effectiveness of severity as a deterrent .
2. Deterrence works through several mechanisms ; likelihood of getting caught , severity of punishment , and perceived public disapproval .
3. By establishing a set minimum punishment , a potential criminal with any knowledge of the penal code knows that , if caught , he/she will face a substantial punishment for his/her crime .
4. If potential criminals know a mild sentence is possible , they are more likely to commit crime in the hopes that they may charm a judge into sympathetically lowering their sentence .
5. The pro need not demonstrate that every , or even a strong majority , of would-be criminals will be deterred by mandatory minimum sentences ; so long as the mandate has a reasonable deterrent effect , it will reduce crime and therefore improve the overall standard of living .

Debate: This House supports mandatory sentencing


Arguments: 1. For example , through a process called `` evergreening '' , drug firms essentially re-patent drugs when they near expiration by patenting certain compounds or variations of the drug .
2. This can extend the life of some patents indefinitely ensuring firms can milk customers at monopoly prices long after any possible costs of research or discovery are recouped .
3. A harm that arises from this is the enervating effect that patents can generate in firms .
4. When the incentive is to simply rest on one 's patents , waiting for them to expire before doing anything else , societal progress is slowed .
5. The current drug patent regime is largely designed to benefit and shield the profits of large pharmaceutical companies .
6. This is due to the fact that most of the laws on drug patents were written by lobbyists and voted upon by politicians in the pay of those firms .
7. The pharmaceutical industry is simply massive and has one of the most powerful lobbies in most democratic states , particularly the United States .
8. The laws are orchestrated to contain special loopholes , which these firms can exploit in order to maximize profits at the expense of the taxpayer and of justice .
9. In the absence of such patents , firms are necessarily forced to keep innovating to stay ahead , to keep looking for profitable products and ideas .
10. The free flow of ideas generated by the abolition of drug patents will invigorate economic dynamism .

Debate: This house would allow the production of generic drugs


Arguments: 1. Thus a flat tax is fairer as it equalized the basis on which everyone pays for access to equal services , and prevents a poorer majority from victimizing a wealthier minority through punitive rates of income tax for the wealthy , which may cause them to flee the country for other states with less taxation .
2. Secondly this removes the ability of the majority of a population to engage in what the French economist Bastiat called ` legalized plunder ' , where they -LRB- as the majority of voters -RRB- assign higher percentages of income tax to the wealthy in order that the state may appropriate and redistribute it to them for their own use .
3. With a flat tax in place , there would be no ability for anyone to vote for a tax rise simply on other people and not on themselves , and thus such policies would receive more consideration and not be used by the majority simply to appropriate the property of others through the law .
4. However , this parity can be achieved by everyone paying the same percentage of their income in tax to the government , and this is exactly what a flat tax is , and so equality in contribution to government services -LRB- mirroring equality in access to government services -RRB- is achieved .
5. This principle of equality is important for two reasons : firstly , if wealthier citizens feel they are being unfairly burdened by the current requirement that they pay higher percentages of their income to fund government services than those on lower incomes , they may feel a disincentive to work hard -LRB- which creates wealth for the whole economy -RRB- , or may even be driven abroad to states with lower rates of taxation or to tax havens .
6. In a welfare state such as the United Kingdom , everyone enjoys the same access to services provided by the government , and so it should stand to reason that everyone should also contribute equally to the funding of those services .
7. As not all individuals are equal in their wealth and income , it is impossible to do this on the basis of everyone paying in the exact same numerical amount of money .

Debate:
This House Would introduce a flat tax