But the bill would not have been a soft option.
And try telling Deborah Bull or Arlene Phillips that dance is a soft option".
But I don't hold the view that reading English is a soft option, or at least it shouldn't be.
Don't be fooled into thinking that distance learning is a soft option - it requires motivation and self-discipline, although students are encouraged to make contact with tutors and colleagues on their course via online chatrooms and video conferencing.
Though he remains concerned about the detail, Buckingham believes the changes, coupled with the government's assertions about "restoring rigour", should at least put the "nail in the coffin" of the argument that media is a soft option.
Alan Beith, the chair of the Commons justice committee, said that it had to be realised by the public and the media that community sentences were not a soft option and could actually be more challenging for offenders.
Any notion that McIlroy is seeking a soft option here would be flawed; not only did he face a nationality debate head-on by declaring for Ireland's team at an early juncture but very recently spoke about his fear that the Olympic narrative could be damaged by scenarios such as Scott's.
Although I enjoyed my time in academia, I soon realised that research is not a soft option and that I wasn't going to succeed unless I became devoted to a single topic, gained a lot of publications to my name, and was prepared to move around the world.
Baker added that a decriminalized model, as adopted by countries such as Portugal, was not a "soft option" and said that the government wanted to "get tough on those who are causing misery, who are causing harm to our society — the drug dealers".
