Chamber
Meeting of the Parliament 17 March 2011
17 Mar 2011 · S3 · Meeting of the Parliament
Item of business
Scottish Executive Question Time
Community Payback Orders
General Questions
The provisions for the community payback order have been in force for only a little over a month. The significant work that went into planning and preparing for implementation of community payback orders has so far enabled a smooth procedural transition from the existing system of community sentences.
Recent snow clearing involved on average 1,314 low-level offenders, who worked 33,707 hours altogether. However, the long-term success of community payback orders will lie in their effectiveness in reducing reoffending in Scotland, which short prison sentences signally failed to do. As the member knows, three quarters of offenders imprisoned for three months or less reoffend within two years, whereas two thirds of those who receive community service orders do not.
Recent snow clearing involved on average 1,314 low-level offenders, who worked 33,707 hours altogether. However, the long-term success of community payback orders will lie in their effectiveness in reducing reoffending in Scotland, which short prison sentences signally failed to do. As the member knows, three quarters of offenders imprisoned for three months or less reoffend within two years, whereas two thirds of those who receive community service orders do not.
In the same item of business
Mr Frank McAveety (Glasgow Shettleston) (Lab)
Lab
6. To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is on how community payback orders are working. (S3O-13350)
The Cabinet Secretary for Justice (Kenny MacAskill)
SNP
The provisions for the community payback order have been in force for only a little over a month. The significant work that went into planning and preparing ...
Mr McAveety
Lab
Can the cabinet secretary justify the £10,000 expense to the taxpayer of keeping the individual who breached the first community payback order in prison due ...
Kenny MacAskill
SNP
I do not interfere in the independence of the judiciary, but I fully support any action that a sheriff feels it is necessary to take. If that is sending some...