Re-offending increased during the covid pandemic according to he latest report.

The official statistics showed the reconviction rate, which is the percentage of offenders who are reconvicted in a year, was 26.9% in 2020-21. This is a 2.6 percentage point increase from 24.3% in 2019-20.

As in previous years, males are reconvicted more often, on average, than females. In 2020-21, the average number of reconvictions per offender for males was 0.45, which was 12% higher than the value of 0.39 for females.

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As in previous years, offenders who committed a crime of dishonesty had the highest reconviction rate (40.7% in 2020-21), compared to offenders that committed another type of crime. Offenders who committed a sexual crime had the lowest (8.8% in 2020-21).

Offenders released from a custodial sentence had an average number of reconvictions per offender of 0.66 in 2020-21, which was 5% lower than 0.70 in 2019-20. Of those convicted in 2021-22 with a custodial sentence, 70.0% had at least one previous custodial sentence in the past 10 years, with 35.7% having between 3 to 10 and 12.9% having over 10.

The data, however, is affected by the pandemic, according to the statisticians.

The Chief Statistician, stated: “The impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on these statistics means we would advise heavy caution in using the data presented in this publication.

“As a result, the data for the 2020-21 cohort is not indicative of longer-term trends. Reconviction rates have increased from historically low rates in 2019-20 across most groups.”