Criminal Proceedings in Scotland: 2023-2024

13. Bail and undertakings

(Tables 14, 15 and 16)

Bail and undertaking definitions

When a person is arrested or charged by the Police, the Police may decide to keep that person in custody. The police will submit a report to the Procurator Fiscal in respect of the person in custody and where the Procurator Fiscal decides that the accused is to be prosecuted, they will appear at court on the first lawful day after they were taken into police custody. At this point, the Court will decide whether the accused should be released on bail until they next need to appear in court for later stages of the proceedings.

In some circumstances, the individual is not merely cited to appear at Court at a later date, but the Police decide to release the individual on an Undertaking to appear at Court on a specified date and time.

On 25 January 2018, the law applicable to undertakings was changed, and is set out under Sections 25-30 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2016. An Undertaking generally has conditions attached including that the person should not commit an offence; interfere with witnesses or evidence or otherwise obstruct the course of justice; or behave in a manner which causes, or is likely to cause, alarm or distress to witnesses. Any further condition that a constable considers necessary and proportionate to ensure that the undertaking conditions are observed may also be imposed. These undertaking conditions are similar to those for bail.

Please note that four additional tables on bail are published alongside this bulletin and can be found under the "supporting documents" menu on the website for this publication. These include bail statistics by court type as well as age and sex. One of the tables presents bail aggravations i.e. offences that were committed while the offender was on bail.

High level summary

In 2023-24:

• 27,067 bail orders were made
• the number of bail-related offences as a percentage of all bail orders made was 31%, and was the highest in the 10-year span
• there were 23,785 undertakings to appear in court

Year-on-year change

Between 2022-23 and 2023-24:

• all bail orders made increased by 2%
• the number of bail-related offences with a conviction increased 5% to 8,355
• the number of undertakings to appear in court increased <1% to 23,785

Change over the 10-year span

Between 2014-15 and 2023-24:

• the number of bail orders decreased by 41%
• the number of bail-related offences decreased by 2%
• the number of undertakings to appear in court increased by 42%

Breakdown by age and sex

In 2023-24:

• 79% of undertakings were issued to males (18,735 people)
• 13% of undertakings were issued to those under-21, compared to 17% in 2014-15

Points to note

The number of bail orders relates to individual bail orders. Unlike the number of proceedings, where we count only one “main” charge per person in each proceeding, multiple bail orders can be issued to a person in a single case. Bail orders can also be issued in circumstances which may not lead to proceedings. However, there is a direct correlation between numbers of bail orders and numbers of proceedings, and any overall trend is likely to be similar in both.

Bail offences are likely to be affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. With the length of time for cases to proceed through the court process affected by pandemic measures, accused persons granted bail were, on average, likely to be on bail for longer.

In the most recent four years undertakings have ranged from 23,747 to 25,046. Whereas in the six years pre-pandemic undertakings ranged from 14,438 to 17,628. This may be attributable to the introduction of emergency Lord Advocate’s Guidelines on Liberation during the pandemic to minimise the number of people held in custody for court.