By Rosie Chalam-Judge, Eleanor Martin
Community Sentence Treatment Requirements (CSTRs), comprising of Alcohol Treatment requirements (ATRs), Drug Rehabilitation Requirements (DRRs), and Mental Health Treatment Requirements (MHTRs), aim to address health needs of individuals on a community sentence and ultimately reduce reoffending.
While there is existing evidence indicating that in some circumstances alcohol, drug, and mental health treatment can have some positive effects on reoffending outcomes, research related to CSTRs is limited. To expand the evidence, MoJ have been working in partnership with HMPPS, DHSC and NHS England to deliver a programme of analytical work to robustly assess the effectiveness of CSTRs, including the Better Outcomes Through Linked Data (BOLD) programme. The BOLD substance misuse team carried out a project exploring pathways between probation and drug and alcohol treatment services and are undertaking further analysis to continue the investigation of the potential attrition between sentencing and accessing treatment services.
This impact evaluation aimed to compare justice outcomes of those sentenced with a CSTR against two comparison groups: those sentenced to community sentences without a CSTR and those sentenced to short custodial sentences. The analysis explored the rate of successful completion of community sentences and proven reoffending measures, including reoffending rate, frequency of reoffending, days to first reoffence, reoffending resulting in custody rate and frequency of reoffending resulting in custody.
There are differences in the characteristics of individuals who are sentenced with each type of CSTR and those who are not. To account for this, a statistical technique called propensity score matching (PSM) was used. This method aimed to create matched control groups of individuals who did not receive a CSTR but were as similar as possible to the groups of individuals who were sentenced to each type of CSTR, so any differences detected between the groups were likely due to whether they received a CSTR sentence or not. While over a hundred variables were included in the analysis, there may be unobserved characteristics not captured, or not captured accurately, in the data available which could influence CSTR sentencing and reoffending outcomes. This is a consideration for any PSM analysis. The analysis also only compared individuals sentenced with and without an ATR, DRR, or MHTR – data were not available on whether they attended, engaged with, or completed treatment. More detail can be found in the methodology section.
This analysis used 2018 sentencing data to allow sufficient time to measure outcomes and to avoid the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Recent investments and initiatives have since been implemented to improve and expand the CSTR provision, therefore this evaluation forms a baseline measure of their impact.
Main findings
Justice outcomes of those sentenced with each type of CSTR and the matched control groups were compared and tested for significance. The matched control groups are referred to as those on a community sentence without a CSTR and those released from a short custodial sentence. These groups are matched to have similar characteristics to each CSTR group, including reported drug misuse, alcohol misuse, and mental health issues. The results were largely positive for ATR and MHTR recipients, with mixed results for DRR recipients. Reoffending rates and other statistically significant results are included in this summary, see section 4 for the full results. Due to rounding, the differences between some figures may appear to not sum exactly.
Successful community sentence completion rate
The data indicated 67% of ATR recipients, 41% of DRR recipients and 78% of MHTR recipients successfully completed their community sentence. This means they served their sentence term without early termination, for example due to a breach or further offence. It was not possible to accurately match individuals in the treatment groups (ATR, DRR, and MHTR recipients) with individuals who did not receive a CSTR to compare sentence completion outcomes, due to availability issues with the data
Reoffending outcomes for alcohol treatment requirement (ATR) recipients compared with individuals sentenced without a CSTR
Reoffending rates were very similar between ATR recipients and recipients of a community sentence without a CSTR (42% and 40% respectively) and ATR recipients and short custodial sentence recipients (45% for both). There were no statistically significant differences, therefore this analysis did not provide evidence to indicate that receiving an ATR impacted the reoffending rate compared with recipients of community sentences without a CSTR or short custodial sentences.
ATR recipients, when compared to those on a community sentence without a CSTR, took 12.42 more days on average to reoffend (118.93 days for ATR recipients and 106.51 days for community sentence recipient on average) and were less likely to reoffend and receive a custodial sentence by 4 percentage points (33% and 38% of those who reoffended, respectively) – these were statistically significant results.
Compared with those released from a short custodial sentence, ATR recipients reoffended slightly less frequently with 0.26 fewer reoffences on average (1.73 reoffences on average for ATR recipients and 1.99 for short custodial sentence recipients) and took 12.07 more days on average to reoffend (118.32 days for ATR recipients and 106.25 for short custodial sentence recipients on average). They were less likely to reoffend and receive a custodial sentence by 5 percentage points (34% of ATR recipients who reoffended and 39% of short custodial sentence recipients who reoffended) and were convicted an average of 0.54 fewer reoffences resulting in a custodial sentence (1.57 reoffences for ATR recipients and 2.12 for short custodial sentence recipients on average) – these were statistically significant results.
Reoffending outcomes for drug rehabilitation requirement (DRR) recipients compared with individuals sentenced without a CSTR
For DRR recipients, there was no statistically significant difference between reoffending rates (63% for both DRR recipients and recipients of a community sentence without a CSTR, 64% for both DRR and short custodial sentence recipients), therefore this analysis did not indicate that receiving a DRR sentence impacted the reoffending rate compared with recipients on a community sentence without a CSTR or short custodial sentences.
Compared with recipients of a community sentence without a CSTR, DRR recipients reoffended slightly more frequently with 0.18 more reoffences on average (3.55 reoffences for DRR recipients and 3.37 reoffences for recipients of a community sentence without a CSTR, on average), and took on average 4.33 fewer days to reoffend (86.64 days for DRR recipients and 90.97 days for recipients of a community sentence without a CSTR, on average). Although small, these were statistically significant differences.
DRR recipients, when compared with short custodial sentence recipients, reoffended less frequently with 0.38 fewer reoffences on average (3.56 reoffences for DRR recipients and 3.93 reoffences for short custodial sentence recipients, on average) and took 12.28 fewer days on average to reoffend (86.66 days for DRR recipients and 98.93 days for short custodial sentence recipients, on average). They were less likely to reoffend and receive a custodial sentence by 6 percentage points (47% of DRR recipients and 53% of short custodial sentence recipients), and were convicted of fewer reoffences resulting in a custodial sentence with 0.58 fewer reoffences on average (3.20 reoffences for DRR recipients and 3.78 reoffences for short custodial sentence recipients, on average) – these were statistically significant results.
These results could be due to multiple reasons, including delay or difficulty in accessing treatment, and increased supervision by the Probation Service of DRR sentences compared with community sentences potentially providing more opportunities for reoffences to be detected. These are discussed further in the discussion and conclusion section.
Reoffending outcomes for mental health treatment requirement (MHTR) recipients compared with individuals sentenced without a CSTR
This analysis indicates MHTR recipients had a lower reoffending rate than those on a community sentence without a CSTR by 8 percentage points (27% for MHTR recipients and 34% for recipients of a community sentence without a CSTR) and short custodial sentence recipients by 9 percentage points (27% MHTR recipients and 36% short custodial sentence recipients). These were statistically significant differences.
Compared with short custodial sentence recipients, MHTR recipients reoffended less frequently with 0.53 fewer reoffences on average (1.01 reoffences for MHTR recipients and 1.54 reoffences for short custodial sentence recipients, on average), were less likely to reoffend and receive a custodial sentence by 17 percentage points (28% of MHTR recipients and 45% of short custodial sentence recipients) and were convicted of fewer reoffences resulting in custodial sentence with 0.69 fewer reoffences on average (1.39 reoffences resulting in a custodial sentence for MHTR recipients and 2.08 reoffences for short custodial sentence recipients, on average) – statistically significant results.
Conclusion
These findings indicate being sentenced with an ATR, DRR, or MHTR had a positive effect on reoffending outcomes compared with short custodial sentences, which is in line with previous research findings. However, the results report mixed effects of CSTRs on reoffending outcomes compared with community sentences without CSTRs. Further research would be needed to understand the reasons behind these findings. There are some key considerations when considering the implications of the results:
As CSTRs may involve closer and more intensive supervision from probation and clinical staff than those on a community sentence without a CSTR, some of which receive little formal oversight, it may be that reoffences are more likely to be detected for those sentenced with a CSTR. This may diminish the ability to detect reoffending benefits of CSTRs, if present.
Delay in accessing or commencing treatment may also influence reoffending outcomes, as previous research has demonstrated engagement in drug and alcohol misuse treatment can reduce reoffending (see section 2.2) and an analysis of pathways into treatment for ATR and DRR recipients found there can be long delays before attending treatment.
Only reoffending within one year of sentence (or release for short custodial sentence recipients) was included and the effects on offending behaviour of CSTR sentencing may take longer to become apparent. CSTR sentencing and treatment may also have impacts that were not measured in this analysis, for example on health, employability, and social support. Overall, the findings of this impact evaluation demonstrate why additional CSTR investment and development in CSTRs has been pursued in recent years, and therefore it is recommended this analysis is repeated in 2026/27 to assess whether the impact of CSTR sentencing has changed over time. The data used have limitations and there are caveats that should be considered, for example the quality or type of treatment received by those sentenced with a CSTR is not consistent – see sections 3.4 and 3.5 for more information.
Ministry of Justice Analytical Series; London: Ministry of Justice, 2024. 80p.