Justice Social Work Statistics: 2025-26
An Accredited Official Statistics Publication for Scotland
The Chief Statistician has released part 1 of the 2025-26 justice social work statistics. This includes information on justice social work services, as well as characteristics of the people involved. Part 2 will be published in the first quarter of 2027.
The number of diversion from prosecution cases commenced fell by 5% between 2024-25 and 2025-26 from 3,594 to 3,425. This was the 2nd highest level in the last ten years.
The number of bail supervision cases rose by 7% between 2024-25 and 2025-26 to 1,629. This was the highest level in the last ten years.
There were 1,560 structured deferred sentences commenced in 2025-26. This was 3% less than in 2024-25 and the 2nd highest level in the last 8 years.
There were 1,422 statutory custody based throughcare cases commenced in 2025-26, 14% up on 1,244 in 2024-25. This was the highest level in the last ten years.
The number of statutory community based throughcare cases commenced was 1,069 in 2025-26, a 3% increase on 1,042 in 2024-25. This was the 2nd highest level in the last ten years.
Background
The full statistical publication is available on Scottish Government website.
Accredited official statistics are produced in accordance with the Code of Practice for Statistics.
Justice social work statistics is published in two different parts. The publication split enables earlier reporting of some annual data by about four months.
This part 1 publication provides statistics on the following areas of justice social work:
- Diversion from prosecution
- Fiscal work orders
- Bail supervision
- Structured deferred sentences
- Statutory/voluntary throughcare
- Throughcare reports
- Home detention curfew assessments
Information is provided for 2025-26 and, where possible, for the years back to 2016-17 in order to show trends over the last ten years. Tables at local authority area level, which have been updated to include 2025-26, have also been published and contain up to ten years of data.
The trend data supplied in the publication was impacted by the Coronavirus (Covid) pandemic. This means that statistics for most areas of justice social work were impacted in 2020-21 and 2021-22. Caution is advised in comparing data from these two years with other years.
Further statistics on Justice Social Work is available: Justice social work statistics - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)