The Scottish Court Service (SCS) has been using its enforcement powers for non-payment of fines, with one Midlothian man jailed for non-payment recently while a Motherwell man was arrested as he attempted to board a flight to Sweden.
In the first case the offender had accrued road traffic fines of around £700 and had failed to keep up payment of the instalments as they fell due. He was jailed for 24 days.
In the second case the offender had failed to pay a fine imposed for a road traffic offence. As a result a warrant for his arrest was issued and he was prevented from boarding his flight until a relative had made payment in full of the outstanding fine.
The SCS advises that everyone who defaults on paying a fine will be given warnings of the consequences of continued failure to pay.
The SCS, as well as obtaining a warrant for the arrest of a defaulter, can also clamp a car known to belong to the defaulter and deduct payment from any money held by a defaulter in a bank account.
According to SCS , the rate of recovery of fines in Scotland is good, with 86% of fines imposed between April 2010 and March 2013 paid already or being paid off by instalments. SCS also reports that, over the same period, around 109,000 benefit deduction orders were obtained and almost 21,000 earnings arrestment orders were granted.
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