Is the death penalty right or wrong? Does it act as a deterrent to serious crime? And is it necessarily an inhumane act? December 16th 2009 sees the 40th anniversary of the abolition in the UK of capital punishment for the crime of murder. In this specially recorded discussion, Professor Gary Slapper, Director of the Centre for Law at The Open University, Professor Barbara Hudson, Director of the Centre for Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Central Lancashire, and Dr. Nigel Warburton, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Philosophy at The Open University, explore some of the fundamental issues underpinning our attitudes to this most severe of punishments. The discussion is chaired by radio journalist Penny Boreham.