Thanks to Dottie for alerting us to this.
From the Parole Board for Scotland Annual Report 2024/2025 (2025/2026 not yet released), 2 386 prisoners were released. Of these, 282 were recalled to prison within 12 months, an 11.8% recidivism rate overall.
https://scottishparoleboard.scot/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/Annual-Report-2024-2025.pdf
All things being equal in terms of influencing facts such as the availability of social rent housing and access to probation supervision staff, you might expect the figure for England and Wales to be around 12 times higher – 28 632 and 3 384.
However, according to Offender management statistics quarterly: October to December 2024, the the number released overall wa 57 277, twice as many.
Recalls were, shockingly, 40 259 (up from only 10 401 in the previous year), 12 times as many per head of population:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c6298ljegkgo
What explains these stark differences?
Two factors are important and can be quantified.
There are currently 5 576 ‘band 4’ probation officers in England.
Scotland does not have “probation officers” as a distinct role. The equivalent is Justice Social Workers (also called criminal justice social workers), who are qualified social workers employed mainly by the 32 local authorities.
Per head of population, you might expect that Scotland would have around 560 of these but has 1 174 up from 950 the year before.
https://www.communitycare.co.uk/content/news/social-worker-numbers-increase-in-scottish-councils
Scotland has twice as many!
A second factor is access to social housing.
Social housing is more prevalent in Scotland than England, comprising 23% of all Scottish housing stock (11% RSLs / 12% Local Authorities), compared to 16.4% in England (10.1% RPs / 6.3% Local Authorities).
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The 'Unstoppable' Talking-up Scotland 
Too many prisoners on remand. Not convicted. Court system broken down costing more. Investment in Court system. Less prisoners on remand etc. Save money. Spend a little to save a lot. Less incarcerated for nought. Not criminalising innocent people. Losing jobs and family units.
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Crime is connected to gender (young male) and addiction. Most crime is committed under the influence of drink and drugs. Too many neurodiverse people in prison. Without receiving proper support. Diagnosis. To healthy, practical pastimes.
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