Transparency data

Unpaid work management information - Summary

Published 6 November 2025

Applies to England and Wales

© Crown copyright 2025

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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/unpaid-work-management-information-update-to-june-2025/unpaid-work-management-information-summary

1. Introduction

Unpaid work, also known as community payback, is one of the options available to sentencers at court. The purpose of unpaid work is to provide punishment and reparation, with individuals carrying out work on projects which benefit their local communities.

A person can receive an unpaid work requirement when they receive one of the following types of court order:

  • community order
  • suspended sentence order
  • youth rehabilitation order
  • enforcement order
  • supervision default order
  • order made in other UK jurisdictions where the case has transferred

This release provides data on the delivery of unpaid work from 1 April 2022 to 30 June 2025. The comparison of periods takes into consideration the latest quarter of data (1 April 2025 to 30 June 2025) and the matching period of the previous year (1 April 2024 to 30 June 2024). By analysing the same quarter of both years, the key points and comparisons are not impacted by the seasonal nature of unpaid work delivery.

2. Individuals with unpaid work

Where a person has been sentenced to an order with a regular unpaid work requirement, the start date is usually the sentence date. Additional unpaid work requirements can be added to an order after it has started - for example, if the order is breached, the court may decide to add extra unpaid work hours. In these cases, the start date is the date the additional requirement was added.

There may be other circumstances where a different sentence and start date apply; however, these scenarios are generally less common.

In the context of this release, a termination is recorded where a person, order or unpaid work requirement has ended, and there is no more active involvement.

  • In the quarter to June 2025, 12,850 individuals were sentenced to unpaid work, an increase of 3.8 percent from 12,380 in the same period in 2024.
  • In the quarter to June 2025, there were 11,620 individuals with unpaid work terminating, representing a decrease of 6.9 percent from 12,485 for the same period in the previous year.
  • Of the 12 probation regions across England and Wales, 9 regions saw an increase in the number of individuals sentenced to unpaid work when compared to the same period in 2024.

Figure 1: Individuals with unpaid work sentenced and individuals with unpaid work terminating, by region, 1 April 2025 to 30 June 2025

(Source: Unpaid work management information data tables; Table 2 and Table 6)

3. Hours of unpaid work

Individuals can be sentenced to undertake between 40 hours and 300 hours of unpaid work which should be completed within 12 months from sentencing.

  • 1,664,320 hours of unpaid work were sentenced in the quarter to June 2025, an increase of 5.9 percent from 1,570,945 hours in the same period in 2024.
  • In the quarter to June 2025, 2,020,305 hours of unpaid work were offered, representing a decrease of 0.6 percent from 2,031,835 hours of unpaid work offered over the same period in the previous year.
  • 1,140,910 hours of unpaid work were credited in the quarter to June 2025, a decrease of 0.9 percent from 1,151,835 hours of unpaid work credited in the same period in 2024.

Figure 2: Unpaid work hours sentenced, hours offered and hours credited, by region, 1 April 2025 to 30 June 2025

(Source: Unpaid work management information data tables; Table 5, Table 11 and Table 12)

4. Further insights

  • 388,065 sessions of unpaid work were offered between 1 April 2025 and 30 June 2025 representing an increase of 1.8 percent on the 381,070 sessions offered between 1 April 2024 and 30 June 2024.
  • 250,335 sessions of unpaid work were completed between 1 April 2025 and 30 June 2025 representing an increase of 2.9 percent on the 243,170 sessions completed over the same period in 2024.
  • At 30 June 2025, there were a total of 35,410 individuals with active unpaid work, a decrease of 2.0 percent from 36,135 at 30 June 2024.
  • Of the 12 probation regions across England and Wales, 7 regions saw a decrease in the number of individuals with active unpaid work at 30 June 2025 compared to 30 June 2024.

5. Project Clean Streets

To date, the unpaid work management information publication has included a subset of data tables for Rapid Deployment Projects - Project Clean Streets.

Rapid deployment work is now delivered as standard in probation regions and is no longer managed separately. As a result, it is proposed to remove this section of the publication from autumn 2026. This means that the last set of data tables which will be available for Project Clean Streets will be for the period up to December 2025. These tables will be published in the next unpaid work management information publication in May 2026.

If the changes announced are likely to cause significant inconvenience, please contact the production team at crosscuttingperformanceenquiries@justice.gov.uk

Through Rapid Deployment Projects - Project Clean Streets, Probation Community Payback teams work in partnership with local authorities to rapidly clean up instances of antisocial behaviour. The work includes clearance of fly tipping sites, litter picking and graffiti removal within 48 hours of notification.

610 individuals attended a Project Clean Streets session in the quarter to June 2025, delivering 13,385 hours of unpaid work.

Since its launch in 2023, Rapid Deployment Projects – Project Clean Streets has been rolled out in 11 probation regions. There has been no delivery in the East Midlands region within the reporting period of this publication.

As Project Clean Streets is not managed under a performance measure, and regions have implemented the project at different times since 2023 (see 2.10 Rapid Deployment Projects – Project Clean Streets in the Guidance document), a comparison against the quarter to June 2024 is not available.

6. Further information

As well as this bulletin, the following products are published as part of this release:

Enquiries about these management information should be directed to:

E Stradling
HMPPS Performance Unit, Analysis Directorate
Ministry of Justice
102 Petty France
London
SW1H 9AJ
Email: crosscuttingperformanceenquiries@justice.gov.uk

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