By Jose Pina-Sánchez, Julian V. Roberts and Jonathan Bild,
This Research Bulletin reports findings from the first comprehensive analysis of ‘sentence inflation’ in England and Wales. Unlike previous analyses, this one encompasses all years since 2005 and all offences.
In a previous research bulletin by the Sentencing Academy Pina-Sánchez et al. (2023) documented a significant increase in sentence severity in England and Wales over the last two decades. However, the extent to which this increase in sentence severity is due to a genuine process of ‘sentence inflation’ was unclear. The changing nature of crime might have affected the offence mix processed through our criminal courts. It is possible that the cases sentenced by the courts have become more serious over the period in question. To the extent that this has occurred it would constitute ‘explainable’ or natural inflation. If the cases sentenced are more serious, sentence severity should reflect this changing pattern.
The analysis relates two indices. One – the Imprisonment Index – measures sentence severity by combining the custody rate and Average Custodial Sentence Length (ACSL). The second index measures the seriousness of cases appearing for sentencing.
The Sentencing Academy’s submission to the Sentencing Review reported new analyses comparing trends of sentence severity and crime seriousness for three offence groups: sexual offences, drug offences, and criminal damage offences. In this report, we expand that preliminary analysis to include all major offence groups. This enables us to estimate the overall increase in sentence severity independent of changes in the mix of offences sentenced.
We estimate that since 2005, sentence severity has increased by 62%, while the seriousness of crimes processed through courts has increased by only 8%. This means that 87% of the increased sentence severity over the period was due to changes in sentencing practice, or as we term it, ‘sentence inflation’. Put differently, we estimate that sentencing in England and Wales is today 54% more punitive than in 2005. This is the first analysis to provide an estimate of the overall degree of sentence inflation in this or any other jurisdiction.
Our analysis reveals that sentence inflation has been far from uniform. Whereas no discernible pattern can be detected for drug offences, or public order offences, sentence severity for offences involving violence or weapons related offences has doubled since 2005. Sentence severity for fraud offences has tripled.
London: The Sentencing Academy, 2025. 7p.