This is the first year report of Home Office-funded pilot studies of three restorative justice projects.
The report focuses on the processes of development and setting up of the three restorative justice schemes funded by the Home Office under its Crime Reduction Programme from mid-2001: CONNECT, the Justice Research Consortium and REMEDI.
It describes in detail the aims and content of the schemes and their early efforts to become established.
This is the final Ministry of Justice report into the restorative justice trials that began in 2001. This concluding report gives the results of the research, highlighting both the positive impact of restorative justice on reducing reconviction rates and the cost-effectiveness of the intervention.
In 2004, the Scottish Executive established a 30-month pilot project in restorative practices in three local authorities, each of which was funded with about £45,000 annually. The pilot project was later extended until 2008.
This final report shares the findings of the collaborative evaluation of the implementation over the first two years of restorative practices in 18 of the pilot schools: one special, seven primary and 10 secondary schools.
In June 2008, the Ministry of Justice released its final report into the Restorative Justice trials that began in 2001.
The concluding report covers the results of the research regarding the impact of RJ on reconviction rates as well as how cost effective the intervention is.
This 2009 research draws on four years of data from three restorative justice services in Scotland to explore the factors associated with service user participation, agreement rates, the use of direct or indirect restorative processes, and different forms of reparation.
Among other things, the results show that participation is more likely if the accused is contacted before the victim, if the alleged offence involves vandalism, and if the accused is male or young or does not have a recorded history of offending.
In 2009, an independent evaluation was carried out on the impact of Restorative Solutions' Restorative Approaches in Schools (RAiS) programme in Bristol.
This evaluation presents evidence for restorative approaches improving attendance and exclusion rates. The report suggests that RAiS works best within a 'whole school approach'.
This 2009 independent expert analysis of the economic benefits of restorative justice revealed that restorative justice would likely lead to a net benefit of over £1 billion over 10 years.
The report concluded that diverting young offenders from community orders to a pre-court restorative justice conferencing scheme would produce a lifetime saving to society of almost £275 million (£7,050 per offender).
The cost of implementing the scheme would be paid back in the first year and during the course of two parliaments (10 years) society would benefit by over £1 billion.
