Several years ago we were involved in a pilot confronting the problem of the low level, low income offender with outstanding fines. These people were and still are the bane of a court's life. The offences they commit are not, in themselves, serious enough to merit more than a fine, but the offender is not able to pay any realistic fine imposed because (a) they have very little income and (b) they are already overloaded with outstanding fines fom previous offending.
The solution which we piloted, and which from the court's point of view was highly successful, was that in these circumstances we could find the person to be a 'persistent petty offender' and impose a community penalty instead. The type of pronouncement involved was: "We find that an appropriate fine for your offence would be (say) £250, but it is clear to us that you are not in a position to pay such a fine. We therefore sentence you to carry out 100 hours of community service over the next twelve months."
Most unusually, the end of the pilot was followed not by a national roll-out but by a period of review which for all I know is still going on. Suffice it to say, we lost this power. Could it be because the community penalty was more expensive to the system than an uncollectable fine? Or am I being cynical?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
And yet the solution appears to be the most likely to succeed.
Unfortunately, many of these "ppo's" are drug addicts and are deemed unsuitable for unpaid work by the Probation Service, so it more often than not isn't that simple.
They really are the bane of any court's life. Also, the problem is getting worse rather than diminishing.
Post a Comment