The Digital Waste Tracking (Scotland) Regulations 2026
Scottish Statutory Instrument 2026 No. 145 — creates 5 criminal offences.
- Made
- 11 March 2026
- In force from
- 1 January 2027
- Extent
- Not stated
- Subject
- Health and safety, environment, waste and fisheries
- Made under
- Environmental Protection Act 1990
Explanatory note
(This note is not part of the Regulations) — published with the instrument by the department that made it. © Crown copyright, reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
These Regulations are the first to be made under powers in section 34CA and 34CB of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 (“the 1990 Act”). They establish in Scotland a digital waste tracking system, the purpose of which is to track controlled waste. The Regulations come into force on 1 January 2027. Controlled waste is household, industrial or commercial waste (see section 75(4) to (8) of the 1990 Act). Part 2 (regulations 3 to 7) and schedule 1 contain provisions relating to the establishment of the digital waste tracking system and default requirements for operators of a permitted facility to ensure the entry of information regarding controlled waste into the digital waste tracking system and to pay an annual fee. This Part also makes provision for outages (when information cannot be entered into the digital waste tracking system) and the correction of errors in the digital waste tracking system. Part 3 (regulations 8 to 12) contains provisions relating to digitally excluded persons, including alternative requirements for recording information that would otherwise be required to be entered into the digital waste tracking system under Part 2. Part 4 (regulations 13 and 14) contains provisions about functions of the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (“SEPA”). Part 5 (regulations 15 to 20) contains provisions relating to offences, compliance notices and enforcement cost recovery notices. Part 6 (regulation 21) and schedule 2 contain provisions about appeals. Part 7 (regulations 22 to 23) contains supplementary provisions including those governing SEPA access to the digital waste tracking system and persons with whom information held under these Regulations can be shared.
Offences created by this instrument
- A person who fails to comply with any of the provisions specified in paragraph (2) commits an offence regulation 15(1) · Status not determined · Strict liability
- A person who fails to comply with a compliance notice imposed under regulation 18 commits an offence regulation 15(3) · Status not determined · Strict liability
- A person commits an offence if the person— a makes a statement which that person knows to be false or misleading in a… regulation 15(4) · Status not determined · Requires proof of a state of mind
- Where— a an offence under these Regulations has been committed by a body corporate, or a Scottish partnership or other… regulation 16(1) · Status not determined · Strict liability
- b it is proved that the offence was committed with the consent or connivance of, or was attributable to any neglect on… regulation 16(1)(b) · Status not determined · Strict liability
What Parliament said about it
Hansard was searched for this instrument by name and returned nothing. That is the ordinary outcome: an instrument laid under the negative procedure is usually never debated, and becomes law without a word said about it in either House.
How Parliament handled it
Parliament's Statutory Instruments service has no record of this instrument, although it covers the period. Nothing is inferred from that.
Check the source
- This instrument on legislation.gov.uk The authoritative text, including amendments made since
- Other instruments from 2026