Electronic Tagging

(asked on 22nd May 2019) - View Source

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what average number of people in England and Wales were subject to (a) electronic monitoring as a condition of a supervision order and (b) a Home Detention Curfew in each of the last five years; and how many of those people subject to (i) such electronic monitoring and (ii) a Home Detention Curfew breached those arrangements.


Answered by
Robert Buckland Portrait
Robert Buckland
This question was answered on 10th June 2019

Electronic monitoring is a vital tool in protecting the public and robustly monitoring offenders in the community and defendants on bail. It supports probation staff and the police in managing offenders and defendants safely in the community, delivering the orders of the court and help them tackle the problems which lead to offending.

The table below shows the average number of people1 subject to electronic monitoring as a condition of a supervision order and Home Detention Curfew.

Supervision order2

Home Detention Curfew3

2014/15

6,750

2015/16

6,352

2016/17

5,823

2,280

2017/18

5,133

2,490

1 Caseload for unique subjects with equipment on 2 Derived from published data for those with a Court sentence (supervised) 3 Figures only available for April 2016 onwards for HDC data. Figures after March 2018 will be published in the HMPPS Digest in July 2019. The table below shows the total number of people subject to electronic monitoring for supervision orders and Home Detention Curfew, and how many of these cases committed at least one breach.4, 5

Supervision Orders

Home Detention Curfew

Total

Non Compliance

Compliance

Total

Non Compliance

Compliance

June 2016-March 20176

26,418

11,694

14,724

7,898

1,543

6,355

April 2017-March 2018

28,122

12,005

16,117

10,322

2,044

8,278

4 derived from number of completions of orders with equipment on 5 please note: a person may have more than one order. 6 completions data only available from June 2016 onwards

If a subject on tag does not comply with an Electronic Monitoring condition or requirement, for example by being absent during curfew hours or tampering with a tag, an instantaneous alert is generated that is sent to Electronic Monitoring Services (EMS). The appropriate authorities decide, based on the evidence, whether the non-compliance event constitutes a breach and if so what action should be taken. The nature of breaches vary, and not all non-compliance events are classed as formal breaches requiring further action. For example, if the subject was at hospital or in custody at the time, and therefore unable to return to their curfew location in time for their curfew. While the majority of non-compliance events will generate an alert than can lead to a breach there are a range of other circumstances that can lead to breach action being taken.

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