Section 7: Restorative justice requirements

Sentencing Act 2020 · 2020 c. 17View on legislation.gov.uk

Part 2: Powers exercisable before passing sentence — CHAPTER 1: Deferment of sentence

Any reference in this Chapter to a restorative justice requirement is to a requirement to participate in an activity—

where the participants consist of, or include, the offender and one or more of the victims,
which aims to maximise the offender's awareness of the impact of the offending concerned on the victims, and
which gives an opportunity to a victim or victims to talk about, or by other means express experience of, the offending and its impact.

A restorative justice requirement may not be imposed as a deferment requirement without the consent of every person who would be a participant in the activity.

For the purposes of subsection (2), a supervisor and the offender do not count as proposed participants.

A person running an activity for the purposes of a restorative justice requirement must have regard to any guidance issued from time to time by the Secretary of State with a view to encouraging good practice in connection with such an activity.

In this section “victim” means a victim of, or other person affected by, the offending concerned.

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Reuse reviewed 21 August 2026 under Open Government Licence v3.0.