Life's a riot on the couch with Eamonn Holmes

I was on Sky News this morning doing the paper review in the breakfast TV slot hosted by Eamonn Holmes, two hits just before 7 and just before 8.

Naturally it's wall-to-wall coverage on the riots. Naturally, people are outraged at the complete disregard and wanton vandalism. On what response should be taken with young people, Eamonn asked me: "Ravi, are you a carrot or a stick man". I replied, in my caffeine-charged, high-adrenaline state: "I am a carrot AND a stick man". As one of my press picks, I had chosen Emma Duncan's column in The Times because I felt she summed up the situation pretty well: "Those on the Left will argue that we should focus on spreading the benefits of prosperity, pointing out that Britain is a pretty unequal country....those on the Right will argue for strengthening the threat of force .... as for me, I don't have time to work out what I think right now. I am too busy dealing with the consequences of the breakdown of social order. The children have to be shipped off to stay with friends, the car is out of diesel and the petrol station has been torched."

As Emma Duncan expresses it, these horrible events are still sinking in for anyone with an ounce of civic pride. The public is still taking in the devastation wreaked on London in particular. Personally, I cannot recall the last time I was so gobsmacked looking at a television screen as when watching the five-generations-old Reeves furniture store ablaze in Croydon. Everyone has a right to be totally outraged and demand punishment for the perpetrators of the violence and the looting, and to ask questions about the police response and the lack of discipline in many young lives. While fear grips numerous pockets of urban England, restoring order is paramount.

But I think it's absurd to believe there is a"carrot OR stick" alternative. The debate is already polarising between those who want to "get tough" on young people and those who want to give them opportunities. The former outnumbers the latter by a distance at the present time. But of course young people are partly the products of the society in which they live, as indeed we all are. So, in the days and weeks to come as we come to terms with what has happened  it is right to ask questions about what kind of society we are bringing them up in. Radio phone-ins and 24-hour news channels are already on the case. Although I think it's far too easy and far too simplistic just to blame the cuts . That is no excuse whatsoever. We're only four months into a four-year programme of deep cuts, after all. And yet, the cocktail of no jobs, abolition of the EMA and unprecedented cuts to youth services won't help prevent this from happening again.

Too many young people are shorn of hope. Because they see no hope for their future, they feel they have nothing to lose. So they have no fear and no comprehension of the consequences of their actions. What we have seen is criminal. But it isn't "criminal, pure and simple". It's criminality that demands a response from adult decision makers led by the coalition government - alongside young people - about bringing about some sort of hope into young people's lives. That hope might come from a mentor where there are no adult role models in the family; it might come from instilling respect for the community in which you live; it might come in the form of a training place or apprenticeship. I don't pretend it's straightforward or that some young people might even be beyond reach. I don't have the answers but I hope the right questions are asked in the right places.  Many of the teenagers on the streets will be parents in a few years. What hope will their offspring have? None, unless we act now.

One of the other things to come out in this morning's papers are images of local residents armed with brooms in Clapham Junction for the clean-up operation. The subs have had a field day, calling the residents "Broom Army", "Riot Wombles" and "The Lavender Hill Mop". Sadly, none of the national media appear yet to have picked up on the fact that young people have also volunteered in the clean-up, including in Ealing. I am worried the riots will prompt the press in particular back to labelling young people in general as "thugs", "louts" and "hoodies". There are 4.5m teenagers in England. Most are law abiding. And very many make a positive contribution, a credit to our land. Let's hope that once calm is restored, that disgruntled adults don't just write off an entire generation.