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<p>The court has discretion as to how sentences should be served. The independent
Sentencing Council issued a guideline, <em>Offences Taken Into Consideration and Totality</em>,
which all courts must follow so that there is a consistency of approach. The court
has discretion as to whether or not to take offences into consideration (TICs), but
where it does so the court should pass a total sentence which reflects all offending
behaviour. The sentence must be just and proportionate and must not exceed the statutory
maximum for the convicted offence. The guideline also says that there is no inflexible
rule governing whether sentences should be structured as concurrent or consecutive
components but, again, the overriding principle is that the overall sentence must
be just and proportionate.</p><p>The Ministry of Justice Court Proceeding Database
holds information on offences provided by the statute under which proceedings are
brought but not all the specific circumstances of each case. Data on offences taken
into consideration are not available from the information provided centrally to the
Ministry of Justice. This detailed information is not reported to Justice Statistical
Analytical Services due to their size and complexity and as such, it can only be obtained
at disproportionate cost.</p><p> </p><p>The Ministry of Justice’s extract of the Police
National Computer (PNC) from which MoJ uses to publish official statistics on offenders’
criminal histories, while it holds information on those offenders who were cautioned
or convicted for recordable offences in England and Wales, it does not in all (most)
cases record data on’ disposal qualifiers’ the variable which allows us to identify
concurrent prison sentences served.</p><p> </p><p>Data on concurrent prison sentences
served is therefore incomplete and unreliable. To provide the information requested,
we would be required to contact all the courts in England and Wales and asking them
to search individual case files in order to establish whether they hold information
on concurrent prison sentences. To collate the information you require, would incur
disproportionate cost.</p>
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