G4S supports Cabinet Secretary for Justice Michael Matheson’s recommendation to explore broadening the use of electronic monitoring in the Scottish Justice System to promote community rehabilitation of offenders and fewer short term prison sentences.

David Byrne, G4S Managing Director for Monitoring Technologies and Services said:

“Today’s announcement shows Scotland is leading the way in considering the effective and broader use of electronic monitoring to better support the rehabilitation of offenders. It is clear that short term prison sentences are not an effective way of reducing reoffending.”

“Scotland’s progressive work in this area is paving the way internationally for more effective use of technology to help reduce the prison population and support the reintegration of offenders into communities.”

Angela Smith, Service Director for G4S Monitoring Technologies and Services Scotland who was a member of the expert working group, said: “Electronic monitoring is very flexible and can be used in Scotland to help reduce reoffending and make our communities safer. Its use ensures that those in the criminal justice system continue to contribute to society. We welcome today’s decision and will work to support the Scottish Government in gathering further evidence.”

The Scottish Government launched a consultation in September 2013 that looked at the future direction of electronic monitoring in Scotland and an expert working group was set up, which produced the report published today. Michael Matheson accepted all its recommendations and committed to a series of demonstration projects to test the enhanced use of electronic monitoring to include Global Positioning System (GPS) technology in addition to the technology that is already in use in Scotland, Radio Frequency (RF).

Electronic monitoring can be used as a standalone measure in place of a fine or remand in custody, in combination with a wider support framework, as a community sentence or an effective means of control to allow individuals to serve part of their sentence in the community, according to the report.  Electronic monitoring could play a greater role in the Scottish criminal justice system, through making more innovative use of the technology available.

In April 2013, G4S began a five-year contract to provide and install electronic monitoring equipment and monitor offenders nationally on behalf of the Scottish Government.

About G4S Monitoring Technologies and Service

G4S Monitoring Technologies and Services is the World's leading provider of electronic monitoring products and systems, Our GPS products are market leading and all products are developed in the UK. G4S supplies the equipment and monitoring systems to the World’s largest electronic monitoring programmes, with well over 40,000 offenders being monitored globally each day using our technology.

Electronic monitoring requires an offender to wear either a GPS or RF electronic tag to communicate the offender's location and movements back to a central monitoring centre.