Annex A - Data and Methodology

The information in Unpaid work hours requirements progressed in 2023-24 section is sourced from accredited official statistics. The high level data has been published as part of the Justice Social Work Statistics - Part 2 - 2023-24. There has been some new analysis done to support this narrative and this data can be found in the supporting excel document.

In Unpaid work hour imposed section, the Scottish Government Justice Analytical Services Criminal Disposals Dashboard publishes management information based on the Scottish Courts and Tribunal Service’s (SCTS) administrative database (COPII). Information from this administrative database is based on management information and an approximation was created for number of hours imposed.

Chart 4: Comparing two different data sources which show the number of hours imposed as part of unpaid work requirements.

The management information used in the disposals dashboard shows the data at charge level, whereas the local authority data is at CPO unit level. For this model, it was adjusted to be nearer the unit level data by using only the maximum number of unpaid work hours per case-accused. Whilst this is not exactly how CPO unit level data is calculated, it did give a good approximation. For 2023-24, this average maximum number of unpaid work hours per case-accused nationally was about 4% lower than the actual CPO unit level data. (Chart 4). The disposals dashboard management information has been used as an approximation for 2024-25. Without this data, this information on hours imposed would be 11 months rather than five months behind the management information collected on unpaid work hours.

The monthly data for CPOs published in SCTS Monthly Criminal Management Information has been used to create further estimates on the number of unpaid hours for the last five months. This information can be copied and published as public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v 2.0.

Comparison between the two data sources at national level is below. There is a slight difference in reporting from the two sources of no more than ± 1.5%. CPOs in justice social works statistics differ slightly on counting for concurrent CPOs. Justice social work statistics also accept revisions to the CPO for at least three years. One of the main reasons for changes in the reporting of this data is the inclusion of data from the current financial year which were in existence before this year, but which had been excluded from previous financial year returns in error.

Table 1: Comparison of data sources, Scotland, 2020-21 to 2023-24

Management information on unpaid work hours section uses management information collected quarterly from justice social work teams within local authorities. There are a number of quality issues that must be considered when this data is being used. These are provided in Introduction and Management information on unpaid work hours section. This information is considered an estimation and there is variation due to the collection time, COVID-19 related restrictions (earlier data), statistical approximation being used for missing data and seasonality of unpaid work hours being imposed.