Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what was the value of court-imposed fines for those (a) imposed in magistrates and crown courts, (b) compensation orders, (c) costs orders, (d) criminal courts charges and (e) victim surcharge orders and unpaid (i) fixed penalty notices and (ii) penalty notices for disorder that have been left unpaid in every year since 2016; what was the total value of those unpaid fines; and what steps his Department is taking to help recover the payments due.

The information requested under (a), (b), (c), (d), and (e) has been provided in the attached table. It is not currently possible to provide the same information specifically for (i) fixed penalty notices and (ii) penalty notices for disorder.

The data shows that the fines balances reduce each year and that the longer it is since the debt was imposed, the more HMCTS have been able to collect. This is often because many offenders can have multiple impositions and are steadily paying them over a number of years.

The Government takes the recovery and enforcement of all financial impositions very seriously and remains committed to ensuring impositions are paid.

The courts will do everything within their powers to trace those who do not pay and use a variety of means to ensure the recovery of criminal fines and financial penalties.

This includes deducting money from an individual offender’s earnings or benefits if they are unemployed, or issuing warrants instructing approved enforcement agents to seize and sell goods belonging to the offender. If the offender does not pay as ordered and the money cannot be recovered by other means then the court can take other actions which includes sending them to prison for non-payment of the fine.