Small group behind large number of crimes

London: The latest sentencing statistics for England and Wales released yesterday paint a picture of a small group of criminals being responsible for an increasingly large number of crimes.

The proportion of repeat offenders sentenced for 15 or more offences has been rising steadily over the past decade. In 2001, they formed just under 18 per cent of those sentenced for indictable offences; by 2011 that had risen to more than 31 per cent.

There is no discernible impact on patterns of sentencing from last summer's riots.

In fact, the number of juveniles (10- to 17-year-olds) entering the criminal justice system for the first time continued to follow the sharp decrease of the past five years.

In 2011, there were 102,700 people of all ages sentenced to immediate custody an increase of 1.2 per cent on the previous year. The MoJ also issued figures on interpreting services in court following the launch of a controversial private contract in January.

They show that Applied Language Solutions (ALS) was still failing to meet its contract targets three months after it took over responsibility for providing interpreters to all courts in England and Wales. The firm's contract with the MoJ requires it to supply interpreters for 98 per cent of all court and tribunal bookings.

In February, the firm had a success rate of only 65 per cent, though that had risen to 90 per cent by April.