Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether his Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of commencing Section 151 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 to allow courts to deal more appropriately with low-level offences by repeat offenders through the use of community orders rather than fines.

There are no current plans to commence Section 151 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, which allows courts, in certain circumstances, to use community orders for repeat offenders who might otherwise expect to receive fines.

Section 143(2) of that Act requires courts to treat previous convictions as an aggravating factor when sentencing. For shop theft offences, the Sentencing Council’s guideline on theft offences came into force in 2016. This guideline allows for the imposition of community sentences for shop theft in a wide range of circumstances. In cases involving significant persistent offending, the community and custodial thresholds may be crossed even though the offence otherwise warrants a lesser sentence.