The sentences were issued to criminals convicted of crimes including theft, assault, shoplifting and property damage.
Criminals are reportedly being allowed to work from home to finish their community sentences (Image: Getty)
Criminals are reportedly being allowed to work from home to finish their community sentences.
According to the data shared by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) through Freedom of Information (FoI) requests, offenders ordered by the courts to complete community payback carried out more than 540,000 hours of online courses last year, reports The Telegraph.
The number comes to around 12% of all completed community sentences last year. These sentences were issued to criminals convicted of crimes including theft, assault, shoplifting and property damage – and the entire equivalent to 68,000 days or 185 years of community sentences.
But the move to allow sentences to be carried out online has sparked outrage – including from a probation insider and a former Home Office employee.
The data was shared by the Ministry of Justice (Image: Getty)
Matthew Brighty, a former Home Office economist now at policy consultancy Bradshaw Advisory, which obtained the data through FoIs, told the publication: “It is shocking that nearly one in five people are serving their ‘sentence’ by simply clicking through web pages at home or helping out in a charity shop.
“The idea of serving a sentence from the comfort of home or a cosy charity shop feels out of step with justice and an insult to victims.
“Communities deserve to see meaningful work being done – work that visibly repairs harm and restores trust in the system.”
A senior probation insider told The Telegraph: “The efficacy of unpaid work needs to be a key focus for the probation service if it is to gain wider confidence from the public and courts.”
Out of the six million hours of unpaid work mandated by courts last year, approximately 4.7 million hours – 78% – were completed, while the rest were either cancelled, unfulfilled, or terminated within 12 months.
Of the completed hours, 542,215 (12%) were dedicated to online education, training, and employment (ETE) courses, and 5% were spent working in charity shops.
An MoJ spokesman told The Telegraph: “The majority of offender’s unpaid work hours are in person. Since 2004, some offenders have been permitted to join online courses designed to get them into jobs and away from crime. This was extended further, under the last Government, in 2011.”
The revelation coincides with Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood initiating a sentencing review in response to the prison overcrowding crisis. The review is expected to propose increased use of house arrest, electronic tagging, curfews, and community punishments as alternatives to incarceration, particularly for shorter sentences.
