Review of Justice Social Work Statistics in Scotland – survey of users 2023

Recommendations

The data user review on justice social work statistics has been very productive. Most of our users have an active interest in this area and use the data provided. The recommendations below will be implemented over the next couple of years. Updates will be reported to justice social work working groups and also in the justice social work statistics publications.

Timing of Publication

Examining the data collection and publication schedule, some of the data could be provided earlier if the publication were split into two. The first part of the publication could be published in autumn and the second part in winter. This is possible due to the nature of the data collection. Some of the data is collected as aggregate (i.e. counts) and some at unit level. The unit level collections, which cover data for community payback orders (CPOs) and drug treatment and testing orders (DTTOs), take longer as they require more quality assuring. It is not possible to reduce the amount of unit level data requested, as CPOs are the most frequently used data. It is proposed that the changes to the timing of the publications will take place in 2024, covering data from year 2023-24. More detail of the timing of this change will be announced in the 2022-23 justice social work statistics publication.

Initially, the publication for 2023-24 will split into two parts and these parts will cover the following topics :

Part 1:

Diversion from prosecution

Fiscal work orders

Supervised bail

Court services

Home detention curfew assessments

Structure deferred sentences

Statutory/voluntary throughcare

Pre-release reports

Part 2:

Criminal justice social work reports

Community payback orders

Drug treatment and testing orders

​​​​​​​Changes to commentary

The splitting of the publication will allow us to reassess our commentary. It is our aim to incorporate as many suggestions as possible, taking into consideration the Scottish Government statistics accessibility guidance.

​​​​​​​Changes to tables

There was a request to increase the flexibility of the data. There were a number of requests for filters to help make comparison between local authority and national data over a longer time span. It is our aim to incorporate as many suggestions as possible, taking into consideration the Scottish Government’s statistics accessibility guidance. There is a possible option to put larger datasets on www.statistics.gov.scot but this might require more support for users to download the data. Any changes to tables will be highlighted in the relevant publications.

​​​​​​​More information

Several of the requests for data are outwith the scope of the justice social work data collection and so cannot be addressed in this review. Many of the extra data requests were based around specific topics of interest. It is not possible to provide tables in the annual publications that will fulfil all users’ specialist requirements but where possible, if we have the data, we may be able to do a specific request.

Those that were highlighted under the earlier section “Possible requests within scope requiring minor changes” will be explored further with data providers to see if the data is available across the 32 local authorities. Changes to data collections normally take around 12 to 18 months, as changes to management information systems may be required. Any changes will be reviewed on an individual basis to see if they can be progressed further. Any changes to data collected will be highlighted in the publication.

There have been a number of requests for data linkage between the justice social work data and other areas of justice and health. This would first require a review and likely changes to existing information governance arrangements, to ensure any future work in this area is compliant with data protection regulations. Any research projects on data linkages would need to be submitted to the Statistics Public Benefit and Privacy Panel. Improving in this area would allow more research of data that is already used for statistical analysis. This is an area that will be progressed.

​​​​​​​Changes to the collection

With changes in the publication, it is worth examining how the data is collected. There has been a request to use the Local Government Data Platform for more of the collection. The unit data collection currently uses this ProcXed.NET platform accessed by all local authorities. We will investigate how ProcXed.NET could be used for the rest of the collection and how this links into the Local Government Data Platform.