Remand in Custody: Community Orders

(asked on 4th November 2020) - View Source

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people (a) are currently on remand and (b) have been remanded into custody in each of the last six months for breach of community orders, by (i) ethnicity and (ii) nationality.


Answered by
Lucy Frazer Portrait
Lucy Frazer
Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
This question was answered on 9th November 2020

A Community Order (CO) is a sentence of the court and is made up of one or more requirements to be carried out in the community instead of prison. A Community Order can run for up to three years and is made up of 12 requirements that can be applied.

Effective enforcement of any sentence of the court is essential in ensuring sentencer and public confidence in the management of offenders. We are committed to ensuring that the enforcement of Community Orders is both appropriate and timely.

Offenders who fail to comply with the requirements of their orders can be returned to court for breach of their community orders. As a sanction, the courts can then amend the CO so as to impose more onerous requirements or revoke the order and resentence.

In some instances, where an offender has breached his community order, a magistrate’s court may commit him to custody until he can be brought or appear before the Crown Court.

Information relating to the number of offenders who are committed to custody for breaching a CO could only be obtained at a disproportionate cost.

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