Sometimes, something happens that is so truly shocking, so deeply disturbing, that it makes you ask: ‘What kind of country am I living in?’

That’s what I asked myself when I heard about the refusal, by the Court of Appeal, to reduce the prison sentence of Lucy Connolly.

She is a mother and the wife of a very unwell husband, as well as a respected childminder. But Connolly is also the woman who, in the immediate aftermath of the senseless murder of three little girls in Southport by Axel Rudakubana, pulled out her phone and sent a tweet that shocked many people.

‘Mass deportation now’, she tweeted, ‘set fire to all the f*****g hotels full of the b*****ds for all I care. While you’re at it take the treacherous government and politicians with them. I feel physically sick knowing what these families will now have to endure. If that makes me racist so be it.’

Is it highly offensive? Absolutely.

But does it justify what was then handed out to Lucy Connolly, 42, by a justice system clearly struggling to regain control over the unrest after the horror of Southport – a prison sentence of nearly three years?

Lucy Connolly, the wife of a former Conservative councillor, was jailed for posting an online rant about migrants on the day of the Southport murders

Former Conservative councillor Raymond Connolly speaking outside the Court of Appeal about his wife's case last week

Yes, you read that right. Despite her never committing an act of violence, starting a fire or assaulting an emergency worker, and having no criminal record. Despite deleting her tweet after only a few hours, then urging people not to join the rioting and unrest.

And despite being highly sensitive to the suffering of children after the death, following a catalogue of NHS failings, of her 19-month-old son some years before – and being, as a result, painfully familiar with the anguish felt by the parents of those poor girls in Southport.

Despite all that, she was jailed for nearly three years.

Yesterday, having already been denied bail, urged to plead guilty and refused temporary release to see her young daughter and sick husband, Lucy Connolly had her attempt to be released early denied by the Court of Appeal.

But what makes this decision even more senseless and outrageous is if you consider it alongside many other recent events in our justice system, all of which help to explain why a public perception of ‘two-tier’ justice is now going mainstream in this country.

How is it right, how is it fair, in light of Lucy Connolly’s situation, that this week a Palestinian man named Abu Wadee, who tried to enter Britain illegally on a small boat and allegedly voiced open support for the Islamist terrorists Hamas while calling for the murder of Jews, was sent to prison for only nine months?

And, while Connolly was requesting her freedom, the Labour justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, revealed that more than 1,000 inmates in this country, including sex offenders and domestic abusers, will be released early to free up spaces in prisons?

How is it right and fair, I would ask Sir Keir Starmer and anybody else who agrees with this judgment, that Lucy Connolly was given a longer sentence than some members of a Pakistani Muslim grooming gang in Telford who sexually abused children?

A protest by members of the Free Speech Union and supporters of Lucy Connolly, including her husband Raymond, outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London ahead of her appeal last week

Lucy Connolly's shocking tweet, posted after the murder of three little girls in Southport by Axel Rudakubana, which led to her being jailed for 31 months

It is notable, too, how much more harshly Connolly has been treated than radical trans extremists who sing songs about ‘killing terfs [trans-exclusionary radical feminists]’, or the rag-tag of radical Islamists and Leftists who have spent months marching on the streets of this country singing anti-Semitic songs and celebrating Hamas. In what kind of country is this hypocrisy and two-tier justice allowed to take place?

And, lastly, how is it right, fair, or just that Lucy Connolly is being kept locked up for so long that she is missing the most important and formative years of her young daughter’s life, while the likes of former Labour MP Mike Amesbury and former BBC presenter Huw Edwards escaped prison altogether.

While Amesbury’s ten-week sentence for assaulting a local constituent was suspended on appeal, Edwards was given a six-month suspended sentence for making indecent images of children.

In what kind of country does this make any sense at all?

The answer is a country that has now completely lost its way and become firmly detached from the Christian notion of forgiveness. Of course, what Lucy Connolly tweeted was wrong. I would certainly not endorse it. But, crucially, she recognised it was wrong and sought to take action almost immediately – a point her critics ignore.

In March, we narrowly avoided the imposition on our justice system of new sentencing guidelines, drawn up after recommendations by the now foreign secretary, David Lammy, back in 2017. These would have encouraged judges presiding over cases involving racial, sexual, and gender minorities to take their identity and mitigating factors into account.

So what about Lucy Connolly’s mitigating factors – what about the death of her young son that left her traumatised? Does that not deserve to be highlighted because she is white and British?

One cannot help but wonder how Lucy Connolly might have been treated were she, say, a transgender activist venting her rage over climate change.

This latest dark chapter in the history of our legal system is in fact about far more than one person. It’s about the rise of a very ugly, biased and un-British authoritarianism in this country.

You see it in the case of the two parents who were recently arrested by no fewer than six police officers after complaining about their local school in a WhatsApp group.

You see it in the very long list of Britons who have been arrested, marched off to their local police station and charged with various speech crimes.

Abu Wadee with a Kalashnikov in a picture on social media. He tried to enter the UK illegally and allegedly voiced support for Hamas while calling for the murder of Jews, yet was sent to jail for only nine months

People like former Royal Marine Jamie Michael, who was arrested and charged after sharing a video criticising illegal migration and calling for peaceful protests. Or veteran Darren Brady, who was arrested and handcuffed for ‘causing anxiety’ by posting an image of Pride flags arranged into a swastika – his attempt to protest what he sees as the unquestioning enforcement of LGBT+ dogma.

You see it in the fact that British police authorities are now making around 12,000 arrests every year because of what people have written online or via mail, or have said on the telephone – much of which simply caused others ‘annoyance’, ‘anxiety’ or ‘inconvenience’.

You see it, too, in how our increasingly authoritarian Labour government, under Sir Keir Starmer, has no intention to curtail the use of so-called ‘non-crime hate incidents’, with more than 13,000 of these Orwellian episodes logged last year alone, and more than 133,000 recorded since they were introduced in 2014.

Under these dystopian measures, anybody can have a black mark put against their name simply if somebody else, without having to provide any evidence at all, perceives them to have said something ‘offensive’.

And you see it, lastly, in the more than 100 Britons who, like Connolly, have been hurled into prison for what they wrote on social media in the aftermath of the Southport atrocities and often in the privacy of their own homes.

Lucy Connolly, put simply, should not be in prison. She should be at home with her daughter and husband, not sitting in jail as a depressing symbol of our country’s diminishing freedoms.