Women’s Problem-Solving Courts aim to provide an alternative to short prison sentences for women, who often have complex needs related to mental health, substance misuse, and trauma. These courts differ from ‘business as usual’ community sentences by providing regular engagement with a specially trained judge and structured support through gender responsive services, to address the root causes of offending, delivered in Women’s Centres.

Alma Economics was commissioned by the Centre for Justice Innovation to develop a cost estimation model for Women’s Problem-Solving Courts. Our role was to build a transparent, flexible framework to estimate the annual unit cost of a woman participating in a Women’s Problem-Solving Court and compare it to a range of alternative sentencing options, including short custodial sentences and standard community sentences.

We provided the Centre for Justice Innovation with a cost estimation framework designed to be updated and adapted as new data became available. This enabled them to conduct further analysis independently, including estimating the point at which Women’s Problem-Solving Courts become cost-saving compared to custodial sentences.

Read the full report here.