UK Offence Report

The Food (Control of Irradiation) Regulations 1990

UK Statutory Instrument 1990 No. 2490 — creates 3 criminal offences.

3offences created
0recorded in force
3revoked
Made
10 December 1990
In force from
1 January 1991
Extent
Not stated
Subject
Food, consumer protection, trading standards, product safety and age-restricted sales
Made under
Schedule 1 to, the Food Safety 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, which apply to Great Britain, revoke previous regulations which prohibited the sale of irradiated food (regulation 11), and permit the sale of specified types of irradiated food (regulation 6 as read with regulation 2, 3, 4 and Schedules 1 and 2) where the irradiation has taken place under licence. Where irradiation takes place in England and Wales the licence falls to be granted by the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, the Secretary of State for Health and the Secretary of State for Wales, acting jointly; in Scotland, the Secretary of State for Scotland is the licensing authority; Schedule 1 sets out the procedure for grant, terms, variation and suspension of licences. It also provides for charges to be payable following an application for grant and agreement for variation of licences and in relation to the carrying out of inspections. Where irradiation takes place in another EC member State, food can only be imported if the irradiation has taken place in a plant subject to official authorisation, recognition of which depends on those specified Ministers of the Crown jointly being satisfied that the official authorisation gives a standard of health protection equivalent to that given by an irradiation licence in Great Britain (Schedule 2—see in particular paragraph 2(1)). Where irradiation takes place elsewhere overseas, food can only be imported if the exporting country is approved by those specified Ministers of the Crown acting jointly, and approval cannot be given unless those Ministers are satisfied that a licensing system with equivalent health protection operates in the exporting country (Schedule 2—see in particular paragraph 2(2)). The specified types of food which may be irradiated, or imported after irradiation, are fruit, vegetables, cereals, bulbs and tubers, spices and condiments, fish and shellfish and poultry (regulation 2(2) as read with regulation 3 and Schedule 1, Part II, paragraph 12 on home produced food and with regulation 4(1) in relation to imported food); regulation 2(2)(e) specifies the limits of overall average dose of ionising radiation which apply. The provisions of any licence granted under Schedule 1 must include a requirement to segregate irradiated food from other food in the premises to which the licence applies (Schedule 1, paragraph 8) and a prohibition on re-irradiation (Schedule 1, paragraph 9). These Regulations also make provision for records to be kept by licensees (regulation 3 and Schedule 1), to be provided on import (Schedule 2), and to accompany irradiated food while it is being stored or transported (regulation 5 and Schedule 3). They also make provision for parallel treatment of food irradiated in Northern Ireland (regulation 7), for a defence in relation to exports (regulation 8), for offences, penalties and enforcement (regulation 9), and for application (regulation 10) of provisions of the Food Safety Act 1990 where those provisions would not otherwise apply to regulations under that Act; thus no specific provision is made for a power of entry, but that power, by virtue of section 32 of the 1990 Act, applies automatically for the purposes of regulations under that Act, whereas the due diligence defence in section 21 of that Act, which would not otherwise apply to these Regulations, is specifically provided for.

Offences created by this instrument

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 records procedure from May 2017 onwards, and this instrument predates it. That is a limit of the source, not a statement that nothing happened.

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