Thanks to this Freedom of Information response published yesterday we can see one reason for the dramatic fall in crime in …
Not only a dramatic fall in crime rates but also a 20 year low in criminal reconviction rates. (Note the major impacts of Community Payback Orders which have been promoted by the SNP Scottish Govt as an alternative to custodial sentences). Link and snippets from news.gov.scot below:
https://news.gov.scot/news/reducing-reoffending-1
Reconviction rate remains at lowest level in 20 years.
Justice Secretary Humza Yousaf has welcomed official figures showing Scotland’s reconviction rate remains at its lowest level since records began.
Almost three-quarters of people released from prison or given a non-custodial sentence in 2016-17 were not convicted again within 12 months – the same level as 2015-16. Meanwhile, the average number of reconvictions per offender was 0.48, representing a 16% fall over the last decade.
The National Statistics also showed that those released from a short prison sentence of 12 months or less were reconvicted nearly twice as often than those sentenced to serve community payback orders (CPOs), the most commonly used community sentence.
Background: The reconviction rate, is defined as the proportion of offenders who are reconvicted within a year after being released from a custodial sentence or given a non-custodial sentence.
The average number of reconvictions per offender, is the number of times, on average, that offenders in a cohort are reconvicted within a year after being released from a custodial sentence or given a non-custodial sentence.
In May the Scottish Government laid an affirmative order in the Scottish Parliament to extend the current presumption against short prison sentences of three months or less to 12 months or less – in order to encourage the greater use of more effective community sentences.
The full Parliament is due to vote on the order this week, following scrutiny and approval by the Justice Committee. If passed, the changes will come into force this summer.
https://news.gov.scot/news/reconviction-statistics-2016-17
Over the longer term, in the decade between 2007-08 and 2016-17, the reconviction rate decreased by 4 percentage points from 31.2% to 27.2%. In the same period, the average number of reconvictions per offender has decreased by 16% from 0.57 to 0.48.
The reconviction rate for custodial sentences was 42.3% in 2016-17, which is a decrease of 1.4 percentage points from 43.7% in 2015-16. The average number of reconvictions for custodial sentences decreased by 5% from 0.86 to 0.82 in the same period.
The reconviction rate for CPOs (Community Payback Orders), the most commonly used community sentence, was 31.2% in 2016-17, which was nearly identical to the figure of 31.1% 2015-16. The average number of reconvictions per offender for CPOs was 0.55 in 2016-17 which was the same as the previous year.
18.5% of individuals given a non-court disposal by the police in 2016-17 (such as a warning or fine), and 14.5% of individuals given a non-court disposal by COPFS, received another non-court disposal within a year.
BoJo and his tartan cronies will be doing their collective nuts that the SNP Scottish Govt is delivering these significant improvements and doing the Day Job thing despite the multiple obstacles the Westminster/Whitehall political system puts in their way. Next stop = Indy.
Talking-up Scotland 