7. Population In-Flows

7.1 Arrivals to prison

[Supplementary Table C1]

An arrival[1] is where a continuous period of imprisonment begins for an individual, and is only counted as such if the arrival occurred on a separate day from any previous departure for that individual.  Individuals can arrive to custody more than once each year and so a single individual may be counted more than once when analysing arrivals.

In line with the patterns reported for the average daily population and the number of individuals spending time in custody, there is a pattern of broad stability in the number of arrivals to custody between 2021-22 and 2022-23.  There were 10,509 arrivals to custody in 2022-23, a decrease of around 2% from 2021-22.  While there has been a longer term downward trend in the number of arrivals to custody, the number of arrivals has been considerably lower than pre-pandemic levels for the last three reporting years (see Figure 18).

Figure 18: Number of arrivals, and unique individuals arriving, 2009-10 to 2022-23

7.2 Arrivals by legal status

[Supplementary Table O1]

Figure 19 shows the number of arrivals varies by legal status category.  Arrivals across all legal status categories remain below pre-pandemic levels and the distribution of arrivals across the categories has been broadly similar for the past two reporting years.  As in 2021-22, untried arrivals accounted for 64% of all arrivals to prison in 2022-23 (compared to 67% in 2020-21, and between 50 and 56% in the years before the pandemic). 

Figure 19: Arrivals by legal status

Likely reflecting the Covid impacts on the operation of the justice system (see section 1.1) and other longer term trends, arrivals across all legal status categories remained considerably below pre-pandemic levels in 2022-23.  Convicted awaiting sentence and sentenced arrivals remained broadly stable between 2021-22 and 2022-23 and untried arrivals decreased by 2%, from 6,859 in 2021-22 to 6,728 in 2022-23.

7.3 Arrivals by local authority

[Supplementary tables C2]

The overall national rate of arrival to prison decreased by a small amount from 1.9 per 1,000 head of population in 2021-22 to 1.8 in 2022-23[2]. 

Arrivals to prison remained broadly similar across all local authority areas between 2021-22 and 2022-23. 

Dundee City retained the highest rate of arrival at 3.4 per 1,000 population in 2022-23.  Local authorities with similarly high rates include Clackmannshire at 3.2 per 1,000 and East Ayrshire, Glasgow City, Inverclyde and North Ayrshire at 2.8 per 1,000.

7.4 Arrivals by deprivation

[Supplementary tables C3]

There was little change to the previously reported pattern of arrivals to prison being most likely from the 10% most deprived areas of Scotland[3].  As in 2021-22, the 10% most deprived areas of Scotland accounted for 31% of all arrivals to prison in 2022-23.  This is a slightly lower rate than the 33-36% level over the preceding decade.

7.5 Arrivals by no fixed abode

[Supplementary tables C4]

In 2022-23, 9.1% of arrivals to prison were individuals registered as of no fixed abode (Figure 20), returning to the approximate rate of 2020-21[4] (9.2%).

Figure 20: Proportion of arrivals of individuals with no fixed abode continues to increase

7.6 Arrivals by offence group

[Supplementary tables O6]

While the overall number of arrivals remained very similar between 2021-22 and 2022-23, this pattern varied by index offence group[5].  Arrivals with a Group 1 violence index offence remained at very similar levels, and comprised the highest volume of arrivals in both reporting years (4,433 in 2021-22 and 4,414 in 2022-23).  Arrivals with a Group 5 ‘crimes against society’ index offence also remained at very similar levels, increasing by just 1% from 2,684 in 2021-22 to 2,700 in 2022-23, as did arrivals with a Group 2 sexual index offence (-3% to 812 in 2022-23).  Arrivals with a Group 7 miscellaneous index offence increased by 9% between 2021-22 and 2022-23 but the overall volume is considerably lower at 115 and 125 respectively.  

There were decreases across other index offence groups in 2022-23.  The largest volume reductions were in groups 3 and 6.  Arrivals with a Group 3 dishonesty index offence fell by 9% from 1,212 in 2021-22 to 1,100 in 2022-23, and those with a group 6 antisocial index offence fell 7% from 695 to 647.  Arrivals for both of these index offence groups remain considerably below pre-pandemic levels – the number of arrivals with a Group 3 dishonesty offence in 2022-23 are less than half the number recorded in 2019-20 (2,434), and the number with a Group 6 index offence are just over half in 2022-23 (1,234 in 2019-20). 

The share of arrivals across the index offence groups changed slightly between 2021-22 and 2022-23 (Figure 21).  There were slight increases in the proportion arriving with index crimes against society (25.9%, +0.6%pts) and violence (42.3%, +0.5%pts) and a reduction in the proportion arriving with index crimes of dishonesty (10.5%, -0.9%pts) between 2021-22 and 2022-23.

Figure 21: Proportion of arrivals by Index Offence Groups, 2009-10 to 2022-23