G4S has secured a two-year extension from the Scottish Government to its existing national Electronic Monitoring contract which could include Global Positioning System (GPS) tracking for the first time from 2019, in addition to radio frequency (RF) tags already in use.

The original five-year contract which began in April 2013 has been extended until March 2020. The use of GPS in tracking offenders may be used, once new legislation currently being introduced in to the Scottish Parliament is passed into law. Under the contract G4S will provide both the technology and monitoring services.

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

“Scotland is leading the way in implementing the effective use of electronic monitoring as a robust alternative to custodial sentencing and to better support the rehabilitation of offenders. There will always be crimes where a prison sentence is the most appropriate punishment, but it has been clearly demonstrated internationally that short term prison sentences do not reduce reoffending.

“The Scottish Government is committed to an ambitious and progressive approach to reducing offending. We are very pleased to be given the opportunity to continue to support the Government in providing an effective electronic monitoring programme.”

The Scottish Government is focused on reducing reoffending rates through the better use of radio frequency tagging and emerging monitoring technology. Plans to expand the use of electronic monitoring to include GPS were announced in October 2016 on the advice of a panel of experts and international research.

Notes to Editors:

GPS tracking technology, when used in conjunction with current RF tagging could be used to give courts a new option of tagging as an alternative to a fine. It can also be used as a condition of bail instead of people being held for short periods in custody whilst on remand as at that point, they haven’t been found guilty or innocent by a court.

GPS improves how offenders are monitored by enabling the authorities to track an offender’s exact location at any given point in time. The technology can be used to establish predetermined exclusion zones, triggering an alarm if an offender strays close or into an area they are prohibited from, with authorities able to respond immediately.

G4S is the world's leading provider of electronic monitoring products and systems, supplying the equipment and monitoring systems to the world’s largest programmes, with well over 40,000 offenders being monitored globally each day using G4S technology. Electronic monitoring requires an offender to wear either a GPS or RF device to communicate the offender's location and movements back to a central monitoring centre.