UK Offence Report

Enforcement of discontinuance orders

article 19 of The Planning and Building Regulations (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Order 1990

This offence was read from the text as made, and no revised version was available, so a later revocation could not be ruled out. Check the current text at legislation.gov.uk.

What the provision says

19 After Article 50B of the Planning Order there shall be inserted the following Article— Enforcement of orders under Article 29A 50C

1 Any person who, without the grant of planning permission in that behalf, uses land, or causes or permits land to be used—

a after the expiry of the period allowed for compliance with an order under Article 29A, for any purpose for which an order under that Article has required that its use shall be discontinued; or

b in contravention of any condition imposed by such an order by virtue of paragraph (1)(a) of that Article, shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to

a fine not exceeding level

5 on the standard scale.

Text as made, from legislation.gov.uk. © Crown copyright, reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0. This is the text as originally made; later amendments are not shown here.

Who it binds, and what has to be proved

Binds
a person
Conduct
acting without the licence or authorisation required
Fault element
Strict liability
Burden of proof
Legal burden on the defendant

The prosecution must prove that the conduct happened. This is a strict liability offence as drafted: the provision uses no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence, so there is no need to show that a person meant to do it, knew about it, or was careless.

Intention, knowledge and carelessness are irrelevant to guilt. They may still matter a great deal to sentence.

The provision gives a defence the defendant must prove, on the balance of probabilities. A legal burden of that kind can be read down to a merely evidential one under section 3 of the Human Rights Act 1998 where placing it on the defendant would be disproportionate (R v Lambert [2001] UKHL 37; Sheldrake v DPP [2004] UKHL 43).

Classifier’s reasoning: no word of intention, knowledge, recklessness or negligence in the offence or its provision.

The defence, as drafted

dard scale for each day on which the use is so continued. 3 It shall be a defence for a person charged with an offence under paragraph (1) or (2) to prove that he took all reasonable measures and exercised all due diligence to avoid commission of the offence by himself or by any person under his control. 4 If in any case the defence provided by paragraph (3) involves an allegation that the commission of the off

What would breach article 19?

These are illustrations, not law. They are generated from the provision’s own words to show the shape of the offence. Whether any particular conduct is caught depends on the full text, on any amendment since, and on the facts.

  1. Starting the activity before the licence is granted, rather than on the day it takes effect under the Planning and Building Regulations (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Order 1990.
  2. Carrying on after a licence has expired, been surrendered or been suspended.
  3. Relying on somebody else's authorisation, where the provision requires the person doing the act to hold one.

Penalty

Mode of trial
Summary only — tried in a magistrates’ court
Maximum fine
£5,000
Standard scale
Level 5
Maximum prison (summary)
Not determined

in Northern Ireland a reference to a level is construed as referring to the standard scale as it currently stands (Fines and Penalties (NI) Order 1984 art.5(3)), not as it stood when the instrument was made.

Sentencing

Offences of this kind are usually sentenced under the guidelines below. This is a mapping by subject, not a finding about this provision, and the links go to a search of the Sentencing Council’s own site.

Prosecution figures

No published per-offence figure was found for this provision, and it could not be matched to a Ministry of Justice offence code. Offences created by statutory instrument very largely do not have one. Absence of a figure is not evidence that the offence is unused.

Status and lifecycle

Current status
Status not determined
Made
24 July 1990
In force from
Not determined
Extent
Not stated

How this was established: read from the text as made; no revised version available, so later revocation could not be ruled out.

What the instrument is for

(This note is not part of the Order) — the explanatory note published with the instrument, © Crown copyright.

Part II of this Order makes miscellaneous amendments to the Planning (Northern Ireland) Order 1972 and related enactments. The principal amendments are to revise the procedure for making development plans, to provide for simplified planning zones, to confer on the Department of the Environment new powers to require planning applications to be made, to issue discontinuance orders and to enter into planning agreements with developers, to provide for the control of hazardous substances and to provide for the application, with certain modifications, of the planning enactments to Crown land. Part III of the Order makes miscellaneous amendments to the Building Regulations (Northern Ireland) Order 1979. The principal amendments are to provide a right of appeal to the Department against a contravention notice served by a district council, to enable a person to challenge such a notice by obtaining a written report from a qualified person and to prevent the service of such a notice more than eighteen months from the completion of the works in question.

Read the full note and every offence in this instrument

Other offences in the same instrument

How this was identified as an offence

Everything above rests on the judgement that this provision creates a criminal offence, rather than mentioning one. That judgement is made by rule, from the words of the provision, and this is the rule that made it — with a confidence of 0.92.

Basis
the provision says a person is “guilty of an offence”
Confidence
0.92 of 1.00

A provision that states a penalty for an offence created elsewhere can read very like one that creates an offence, and the rules can mistake the one for the other. If the text quoted above sets a penalty for something made an offence by another provision, treat the classification on this page with that in mind, and read the instrument.

Check the source