Sentences which can be imposed upon someone committing an offence after 1st February 2011 and which offence is punishable by imprisonment are about to change radically.

Sentences of imprisonment for less than 3 months will become rare and need to be justified. Probation, community service and supervised attendance orders will be swept away to be replaced by Community Payback Orders. Community Payback Orders can also be imposed in cases which were not originally punishable by imprisonment when, for example, someone fails to pay his fine. Given the recent published statistics for non-payment, this new punishment could become quite common.

In short, the new sentences will be admonition, fine, community pay back order or jail together with endorsing driving licences or disqualification etc as appropriate.

There was much debate about the value to either the prisoner, who will not have sufficient time to benefit from attempts at rehabilitation, or the community, as keeping someone in prison is an expensive option, in sentencing someone to less than 3 months in prison. The Scottish Parliament has decided that from February there will be a presumption against such short sentences. This does not stop the courts from passing such a sentence but makes it unlikely they will. It is intended instead that a Community Payback Order is imposed.

What are they about? The answer is in their title. An offender has broken the laws of our community and is to be punished by paying us back

The new orders can be imposed as a stand alone penalty or be in addition to a fine. Previously the court couldn't impose a fine and probation/community service. Now it can.

These new orders fall into 3 groups. The first two are simply requirements to carry out unpaid work or other activity of up to 100 hours or up to 300 hours. The 3rd group involve additional requirements such as being subject to supervision, paying compensation, undertaking drug or alcohol treatment etc.

The next change imposed by the new orders is the time in which they have to be carried out. Community service had to be completed within a year. Now the offender only has 3 months to complete the Community Payback Order if for less than 100 hours or 6 months if over. Furthermore it is meant to start within 7 days of being imposed.

Up to now, no-one could be put on probation or community service without the court delaying passing that sentence until a social enquiry report had been obtained. That requirement does not apply to the new order if imposing simply unpaid work or other activity for less than 100 hours.

What does all this mean to people who are not habitually before the courts?

It applies to offences "punishable by imprisonment". That is a great deal wider than you might imagine and includes all common law offences, including minor breaches of the peace. The requirement is that it is competent to imprison for it, not that imprisonment is merited for it. It is potentially applicable to very many people indeed.

The main aim is to make punishment more relevant and effective. It will only be so if it is enforced and those who fail, without reasonable excuse, to carry out the work or other activity are brought back before the courts quickly. The second aim is to reduce the prison population. However we may well find the prisons emptied of the short sentence prisoners becoming filled instead by those failing to complete Community Payback Orders.