ELECTRONIC MONITORING MILESTONE
100,000 OFFENDERS TAGGED

This week the number of offenders tagged in England and Wales will pass the 100,000 mark. A remarkable figure for an option that has in the past been ridiculed and is now the largest out of all the tagging schemes in Europe. 

To mark this milestone the Prison Reform Trust is publishing a briefing on electronic monitoring which highlights how tagging has proved to be a successful form of punishment. It not only allows adult and juvenile offenders to receive close supervision in the community but also ensures a smooth transition for prisoners back to their homes.

Two thirds of electronic monitoring is carried out under the Home Detention Curfew scheme. This allows prisoners to leave jail up to 90 days before their release date in order to ease the transition from custody to community.  The scheme was extended by the government last year when the prison population reached record levels. So far it has been extremely successful with 90 per cent of prisoners completing the scheme. Less than three per cent of prisoners have re-offended whilst under curfew.

Electronic monitoring is also used to implement curfew orders for adults and juveniles, to monitor juveniles on bail, and is an important element in special supervision programmes for juveniles in the community.  It has proved to be both a positive and punitive experience for offenders enabling them to stay in employment or education, maintain family ties and keep their accommodation, key factors that prevent re-offending. For juveniles sentences that include electronic monitoring have had a significant impact on reducing reconviction rates. 

Speaking today, Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust said:

“Some loss of freedom is the price to pay for many crimes and it is good to see that tagging is proving easily as effective, less damaging and cheaper than stacking minor offenders up in overcrowded jails.

With the prison population set to reach record levels and the UK now the jail capital of Western Europe tagging needs to be used more widely and, instead of just using it to increase the numbers that leave prison early, the government should extend electronic monitoring and close supervision to be part of more effective community punishments that genuinely rehabilitate offenders”

NOTES TO EDITORS:

1. More than two-thirds of all electronic monitoring is carried out under the Home Detention Curfew scheme. On 31 January 2003 the total numbers of prisoners released on the scheme was 67,245. (For full details see enclosed briefing)

2. Tagging is also used to implement curfew orders for adults and juveniles and for other disposals for juveniles. On 31 January the total number of offenders tagged under these measures was 29,485. (For full details see enclosed briefing)

3. On 28 February 2003 the prison population in England and Wales stood at 72,256.  This is an increase of 2,364 in the last 12 months. In the past month the prison population has risen by more than one and a half thousand. (The current maximum capacity is 75,536).

4. The UK now has the highest imprisonment rate in the European Union at 139 per 100,000, taking over from Portugal which has an imprisonment rate of 131 per 100,000.

5. The number of prisoners in England and Wales has increased by over 25,000 in the last ten years.  In 1993, the average prison population was 44,566.  When Labour came to Government in May 1997 the prison population was 60,131.  This continued to increase, and stood at 66,105 when David Blunkett became Home Secretary on 8 June 2001.

6. The number of women in prison has increased particularly dramatically.  Ten years ago in 1993 the average female prison population was 1,560.  Five years ago in 1997 it stood at 2,680.  On 25 February 2003, there were 4,326 women in prison, an increase of 177 per cent in the last ten years.

7. Over the last year prison overcrowding has been at its highest recorded level. Between April and November last year there were 80 prisons out of the 137 in England and Wales which in terms of their average population were overcrowded. At the end of December the number of overcrowded prisons was 74.

8. Building new prisons has not been a solution to prison overcrowding.  In the last ten years 19 new prisons have been opened.  Of these, 16 are overcrowded.

9. In 2002 there were 94 suicides in prisons in England and Wales. This is a rise of 29 per cent on the previous year’s total of 73. The dramatic rise in suicides is linked to overcrowding.

10. Recent Home Office projections predict a prison population of anything between 91,400 and 109,600 by 2009. This means the prison system will be under even more pressure, jeopardising the functioning of the entire criminal justice system.

11. The number of prisoners reconvicted within 2 years of release has increased to 59 per cent. This is a rise of one per cent since 2000 and three per cent since 1997. 

12. The reconviction rate for male young adults over the same period is 74 per cent.

13. The reconviction rates for burglary offences over the same period, which account for the second largest proportion of sentenced male prisoners (17%), remains very high at 75%.