Rehabilitation of Offenders Act

The Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 enables some criminal convictions to become 'spent', or ignored, after a 'rehabilitation period'.

A rehabilitation period is a set length of time from the date of conviction. After this period, some ex-offenders may not need to mention their conviction when doing things like applying for accommodation or a job, although for some jobs you may still be asked to disclose ‘spent’ convictions e.g. if you were applying for a job working with children or vulnerable people.

The Act is more likely to help people with few and/or minor convictions. People with many convictions, especially serious ones, may not benefit from the Act.

Rehabilitation Periods
The length of the rehabilitation period depends on the sentence given - not the offence committed. For a custodial sentence, the length of time actually served is irrelevant: the rehabilitation period is decided by the original sentence. Custodial sentences of more than 2 1/2 years can never become spent.

The following table helps explain rehabilitation periods and when sentences become spent (i.e. do not need to be declared when applying for accommodation, a job etc.):

Sentence	Rehabilitation Period	Rehabilitation Period
	People aged 18 or over when convicted	People aged 17 and under when convicted
Prison Sentence of 6 months or less	7 years	3.5 years
Prison sentences or more than 6 months to 2.5 years	10 years	5 years
Borstal (abolished in 1983)	7 years	7 years
Detention Centres (abolished in 1988)	3 years	3 years
Fines Probation compensation community service combination action plan  curfew orders drug treatment and testing reparation orders	5 years	2.5 years
Absolute discharge	6 months	6 months

With some sentences the rehabilitation period varies 

Sentence	Rehabilitation Period
Probation, supervision, care order, conditional discharge or bind over	1 year or until the order expires (whichever is longer)
Attendance centre orders	1 year after the order expires
Hospital orders (with or without a restriction order)	5 years or 2 years after the order expires (whichever is longer
Referral Order	Once the order expires