Incarceration rate in the UK 2008-2022
England and Wales had an incarceration rate of 132.3 per 100,000 people in 2022, compared with 135.8 for Scotland and 83.6 for Northern Ireland. In 2008, Scotland had a higher incarceration rate than England and Wales, but this declined at a faster rate than those two countries after 2012, although the recent uptick in 2019 has seen Scotland once again have the highest incarceration rate in the UK. Northern Ireland has consistently had the lowest incarceration rate of the UK.
