The supervision of community orders in England and Wales

Download or read book The supervision of community orders in England and Wales written by Great Britain: National Audit Office and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2008-01-31 with total page 76 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Criminal Justice Act 2003 introduced a new style of community sentence known as a community order. For offences committee after 1 April 2005, magistrates and judges have been able to tailor communty sentences to the severity of the offence and, at the same time address offending behaviour. The most common order contains a single requirement obliging the offender to complete specified number of unpaid work hours. The National Probation Service supervises all offenders subject to such orders, plus those released from prison on licence or given other sentences to be served in the community. This report examines how well they have been implemented and whether they are meeting sentencing objectives. It is felt the National Probation Service could improve efficiency by increasing the consistency with which community orders are implemented within local Probation Areas. Better data on capacity, costs and the number of orders completed as sentenced would help the Service demonstrate value for money. The report makes several recommendations to this end.