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10.1 Statistical comparisons between Scotland and other parts of the UK on many criminal justice topics must be treated with caution. They can be misleading owing to differences in the legal systems, procedures and crime classifications applying in each country. Statistics on reconviction rates are no exception to this, and the comparison made in Table 17 between reconviction rates in Scotland and the published figures for England & Wales and Northern Ireland needs to be qualified for a number of reasons.
10.2 The reconviction rates for England & Wales were produced from an analysis of offenders originally convicted of standard list offences. (These cover all indictable and some of the more serious summary offences, but exclude most summary motoring offences and other less serious summary offences such as prostitution.) The published analysis covered samples of offenders discharged from custody or who commenced community penalties in 1995. A downward adjustment of 4 percentage points, to account for pseudo reconvictions, should be made to the rates quoted for the different types of community disposals before comparing with the rate for those discharged from custody.
10.3 The reconviction rates given for Northern Ireland relate to an analysis of offenders aged 17 or over who received a non-custodial disposal during 1996 and a sample of 146 offenders released from custody in that year. The source data was adjusted to take account of the outcome of appeals and also to exclude known pseudo reconvictions.
10.4 For comparison purposes, convictions for breach of the peace and offences related to prostitution have been removed from the data for Scotland in order to provide an approximation to the set of standard list offences in England & Wales. As noted in section 3.3, the Scottish Offenders Index does not cover convictions for motor vehicle offences and for most minor statutory and common law offences.
10.5 In overall terms, the percentage of offenders reconvicted within two years of their index conviction were broadly similar in Scotland and England & Wales, with higher rates observed for those discharged from a custodial sentence and those given probation compared with other types of disposal. The reconviction rate for offenders in Scotland who were given community service appears lower than in either England & Wales or Northern Ireland. In all countries, similar variations in the reconviction rates for different types of offenders appear to exist, with higher reconviction rates for males, younger offenders and those with previous convictions.
10.6 Further details on the published reconviction figures for England & Wales and for Northern Ireland can be found in the publications referred to in the footnotes to Table 17.
|
Persons released from a custodial sentence or given a non-custodial sentence
in 1995 | Table 17 |
| Index disposal in 1995 | Scotland(1) (overall) | Scotland(1) (excl. pseudo reconvictions) | England & Wales(2) | Northern Ireland(3) |
| Discharged from custody | 61 |
51 | 58 | 49 |
| Suspended custodial sentence |
- | - | - |
46 |
| Community Service Order | 40 |
29 | 52 | 58 |
| Probation/Supervision Order |
56 | 43 | 59 |
52 |
| Combination Order | - |
- | 60 | - |
| Fine |
32 | 23 | 43 |
27 |
| Other | 27 |
21 | 44 | 34 |
(1) Adjusted to exclude convictions for breach of the peace and offences
related to prostitution.
(2) Further details on these statistics can be found
in Home Office statistical bulletin 19/99, Reconvictions of offenders sentenced
or discharged from prison in 1995, England and Wales, published October 1999.
(3) Data relate to 1996. Further details on these statistics can be found in Northern
Ireland Office research and statistical bulletin 3/2000, Adult reconviction
in Northern Ireland, published June 2000.
Endnote
The statistics on reconvictions which are presented in this bulletin represent only a selection of those which can be derived from the information held on the Scottish Offenders Index. Comments and suggestions for further analysis are welcomed. These should be directed to the enquiry point given at the end of this bulletin.
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