The prisons are full?

Or so it seems, the last few months in the UK have on and off stories about the prisons reaching crisis point in numbers. It's a complex issue that's for sure. But then something struck me, there's often stories about pensioners taking a stand and threatening not to pay their council tax (a UK local tax that keeps rising and has little care for ability to pay).

You never hear in these cases the judge saying "dammit the prisons are full", they are always told they'll serve time. Makes me wonder if there's a part of the prison population just reserved for this, or maybe the more accountable you are to society the easier your offence is to solve through threatened or actual prison time.

Still an interesting paradox.