Scottish Prison Population Projections: February 2024 Edition

3 Overview of Scottish Prison Population and Court Demand Trends

Figure 1 shows that since 2020 there have been substantial changes to the total, remand, and sentenced populations both during and after the pandemic.

Total population

The prison population was relatively stable (within the range 7,350 to 7,650) from September 2020 until late 2022. Last year it rose substantially, especially between 1^st February 2023 and 1^st October 2023 when it increased by over 500 from 7,400 to almost 7,950. In the period from early October until late December 2023 the total population was relatively stable (between 1^st October and 21^st December it remained between 7,910 and 8,030). The daily prison population briefly exceeded 8,000 on a total of seven days in November and December 2023. The population reduced in late December, reaching just over 7,800 on 23^rd December, before rebounding slightly, as expected.

Remand population

The remand population increased at the beginning of 2022, reaching a high of nearly 2,300 on 1^st February 2022, then decreased gradually (other than around December 2022/January 2023), reaching just over 2,100 on 1^st April 2023. During April and May 2023 the remand population increased, to reach a peak of just over 2,300 in late May. From around August the remand population generally decreased gradually, reaching around 2,100 on 1^st January 2024. The outlook for the remand population in early 2024 remains uncertain and it is unknown whether it will follow the trends seen in the early parts of recent years.

Sentenced population

The sentenced population decreased slightly during 2022, from around 5,350 in January to around 5,250 in December 2022. In contrast, during 2023 the sentenced population increased markedly, reaching a peak of nearly 5,900 in December 2023. The sentenced population reduced a little in late December but increased again slightly in early January^[3].

The sentenced prison population from 2020 to 2023, sub-divided by sentence length is shown in Figure 2 below. The population serving sentences of less than or equal to one year in length increased in 2023^[5]. The population serving sentences of one to four years also increased during 2023. The population serving overall sentences of more than four years, as well as those serving Orders of Lifelong Restriction, have seen continuous increases over several years and now exceed pre-pandemic levels. The population serving life sentences has seen a small gradual decline since 2020 (which continued in 2023).

The growth in the total prison population during 2023 was driven by a rise in both remand and sentenced arrivals to custody⁴. The remand population is influenced by the level of new cases registered and cases concluded in Scottish Courts ^[7]. The level of court throughput (case conclusions) also has implications for the flow into the sentenced population. The Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (SCTS) frequently publish information on the level of registrations and conclusions across all courts^[8]. The charts in Figures 3 to 8 below show registrations and conclusions for High Court, Sheriff Court Solemn and Sheriff Court Summary. Figure 3 shows the number of High Court indictment registrations between 2014/15 Q1(covering April to June 2014) and 2023/24 Q2 (covering July to September 2023)^[9]. There were 939 High Court indictments in 2022/23, which was an increase of 26% compared to 745 in 2021/22. As shown in figure 4 the introduction of a further 2 additional High Court courtrooms in April 2023^[10] was followed by two quarters (Q1 and Q2 2023/24) when the conclusions were higher than in any other quarter since the first COVID-19 lockdown in March 2020. Similarly, as shown in figure 6, following the introduction of 6 further Sheriff Court Solemn trial courts in April 2023, conclusions in 2023/24 Q1 and Q2 were higher than at any time since at least 2014/15 Q1. Case registrations (see figure 5) in Sheriff Solemn have also been high recently; the levels in 2023/24 Q1 and Q2 of over 1,850 indictments each were both higher than in any other quarter since at least 2014/15 Q1.

The level of complaints registered in Sheriff Summary Courts has been increasing in recent quarters (see figure 7), and was at its highest level in 2023/24 Q2 since 2020/21 Q2. Sheriff Court Summary conclusions are down compared to last year. At 15,566, the number of Sheriff Summary complaint conclusions (see figure 8) was around 7% lower in 2023/24 Q2 than in 2022/23 Q2 (16,778).

Taking all courts into consideration, the levels of case registrations and throughput contributed to an elevated level of remand and sentenced arrivals in the first half of 2023/24.

SCTS monthly management information^[17] shows that the national total trials scheduled across all criminal courts increased steeply, due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, by around 140% from 18,100 in April 2020 to over 43,600 at its peak in January 2022. By the end of November 2023 it had fallen to less than 28,000. Recently, the number of outstanding trials in High Court (see figure 9) decreased by 5% from 687 to 651 during the first 6 months of 2023/24. In addition, the number of Sheriff Solemn outstanding trials (figure 10) decreased by 14% over the course of the first 6 months of 2023/24. As figure 11 shows, the number of Sheriff Summary trials outstanding increased slightly between the end of 2022/23 Q4 and the end of 2023/24 Q2.